The New York herald., 1875-10-01
THE RUSSIAN SOCIALISTS.
TIE NIHILIsTs AND THEIR THEoRIEs-THE
MIR AND THE sTATE-RUssIA HONEY
coMBED BY sEcTs OF FANATICS
[From the london Daily News, 5.


CoMBED BY sECTs OF FANATICS
[From the London Daily News, Sept III
We have been accustomed 10 hear OF NihiIists as
body Of fanatics whose theories uninte lligble
and whose practices we're revolving When some years
ago mysterously disappeared probably 70 serve
his private ends report got about that he had been
murdered BY his brother Nhiis for the excellent
that no engaged to be married. The Nihuists
understood to object like tho Mancheans to all
that sort Of thing, and It used to be limited that they
wished to carry into practice the theory attributed to
Schopenhauer that the the human race
disappears from earth the better Apparently
the Russian government holds that there
IS some truth In these anti-social charges
A document is in circulation which pro-
fesses 10 contain tho accusations brought by NJ
Zycharef the Imperial Procurator, against the Mill
lists Mention is made of charges of disgracefu and
criminal nature which tho society denies with scorn
To send the whole human straight into Nirwana is
not they allege their object Reform not destruction
is what they aim at and their reforms are reported 10
be devised a large and liberal scale Nothing will
satisfy these thorough going short Of the abolition
Of the State, which Is hostile to the Mir. Now,
IDOL oF RUSSIAN SOCIALISTS
II Is the primitive form of Communal land tenure
once, it may almost be said universal institution
which survives in Russia and has left its traces to this
day Scotland To overthrow the State and to make the
bounds is only the first step OF the Nihihsts
They to go TO overthrow capital to regenerato
humanity and to create new human society Lovers
of the Republic and undivided poets like Mr.. Swim
burne, for instance, have sometimes looked Russia
as despot-riddcn horde of slaves. "Snows says the
inspired the bard "choke the huge Russian woes "
After the of the plans of Nihism, Rus
sa must be acknowledged to be- what ii is, really adj
vanced country. The Nihist programme is, as Toad
in the hole in De Quncey said of artistic murder
''one that you recommend to friend.n Here are
half measures, no ampering with mere expedicncy
vote for the Evil One, because he would
burn everything down and start fresh
was a Nlhist without knowing it. There
is only political scheme which, TO the best of
knowledge, comes at all near tho Nihilist When
there talk Of that mystic society Of the Rosy
Cross adept, or pretended adept published plan
for 'sThe Universal and General Reformation of the
whole wide World" But his remedies said TO have
been less heroic than those Of enlightened Muscovy
One of the queeres features in this propaganda is the
obscurity of Its origin and the sudden power 1t is said
have acquired 1t only in 1872 that the clubs in
the Russian universities took up Socialism. Such
clubs, OF course, usual wherever young meet
The charm of exclusiveness and secresy gives birth
every summer in England to little coteres of
undergraduates, who call themselves by quaint
names, and, greatly daring, wine. There was prob
ably at first little difference between the Lovers OF Tea
of the Russian Universities and the b. N g. Vampires
the Adelphi tho A. d. O. of oxford and Cambridge
If there was anything TO choose the Lovers OF Tea
might well seem the more quiet and well conducted
young men. But behold the patrons of the modest
herb read Bakounn, who seems to outdo all the revolu
tionaries, and whose hobby as George Sands says is
students thirsted for nothing less than
blood, and in three years they have converted
distinguished scholars artisans, tradesfolk young
ladies' and Prince Peter Krapotkin. Even a
Judge put money, very large sum in roubles into
the The local boards Of mobiles, with praise
worthy unselhshness, aided cause which means 10
raise the newest couehes socidIes TO equality with
princes NJ. zycharef really appears to have been
charged with the task of framing
AN INDICTMENT AGAINST HALF A PEOPLE
1t is difficult imagine the state Of things in which
It be seriously believed that vast proportion of all
fpt Gfnfa win
overthrow society. The Nihilists said to have
locked future with Germany their opportu-
nifty to revolt and to introduce what the Latin Gram
mar would call very appropriately res nqcdc Nothing
has yet been heard of political speculation.
When, iew weeks ago, an ingenious contemporary
speculated that mutiny in the Russian army
of the events that would provide the world with big
topic it very guessing at this largest topic OF
al-namey, Society destroying itself for idea Of
Bakounin's
In the difficulty of ascertaining how much of tho
charge attributed to NJ Zycharef Is genuine II is Of
impossible to say whether the Russian govern
ment breads the approach Of an unhcardof revolution
in human nature and fears that ideas which have
always been the dream Of the few should have become
the desire of the many Russia is at all evente in the
position of State where tho widest schemes of reform
appeal to a people previously ignorant and 10 society
hOneycombed with strange of fanatics Russia,
it has been said, in the aspect which it turns TO
Western Europe is mere facade OF laws and insttu-
tions, which hides tho real life Of the people 'Hoy
Russia" is full of heterodox sects, which retain
revive the confused doctrines OF Gnosticisn The
same ideas recommend themselves to the half
minds OF the Muscovtes as of the old Roman Empire
and hereses and arise which classified un-
der the ancient titles of theology.
SECT KHLYSTY
answers TO the Fagclants OF the fourteenth century,
and Origen would have found practical agreement
among the Skoptsy These fanatics SAID like so
many religious manacs such as Postcl and others, 10
recognize constant incarnation OF Deity in their lead
Like the Dervishes and the Shakers, the Khy-
sty find religious consolation in spinning round
in ecstatic dance. They said TO have
disciples among princes and among the
clergy Reaction against Votatriansm has
sonally taken this shape even among educated Rus
slams and reaction against gross ascetcisms has pro-
duced the gross proigacy attributed the Shakouny
These devooes said to continue the revolving
tices Of the Sabbat, which Mchelet has painted in
than of his works To repeat all that is
ported of the Shakouny and of the Skoptsy would be
TO tell old and hideous tale Of lust and cruelty
excited by false religious motives. IL is possible
enough that the long current scandals about these
ecstatics have been lately revived, and attributed TO
the Nihsts. Whatever the truth Of the matter may
be, il cannot DO doubted that repression of free
thought and speech make secret societies OF evil
possible, and makes tales about them credible.
Despoc governments like lazy nurses, forced TO
keep boges to terry their subjects with and the bogy
OF societies Is sometimes nursed into terrible
reality. In the history OF such societies IL would be
nard 10 find one, for the Jesus not a in point
which has succeeded in the political schemes attributed
to It, That large proportion OF the Russian peoples
conspiracy against the State is not readily cred
ibe That Russian society is honeycombed with clubs,
that the peasantry infected with ugly forms Of fa
natcsm and that the crimes of the latter attributed
to the instigaton OF secret societies, is very readily