The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-01-13
SCORES MODERN SOCIETY
COUNT TOLSTOI COMPLETES
WORK THAT Is EXPECTED TO
CAUSE A SENSATION
SOME EXTRACTS FROM IT
He Declares That Republics Are as
Diseased as MonarchieS In
the COrpse-Russian
Institutions.

The appearance of a new work by
Count Loe Tolstoi, the renowned author
of 1.-The treutzer Sonata" has for the
past dozen years been an event of the
first Importance In the literary world, and
hence, when the rumor spread few
weeks ago that a new book by him would
soon appear, there was much speculation
as to It's theme, and more than one eff
fort WAS made to obtain extracts from
It with the object of publishing them in
some foreign periodical ard thus satins
in a measure public curiosity.
This rumor, while entirely true, was
yet to some misleading, the New YORK
Journal says. The fact is that for several
months Count Tolstoi has been busily
engaged on two works and not merely on
one. So hard, indeed, has he worked on
them that he gave up altogether his
customary pursuits, such as digging,
chopping wood and drawing water, and
spent at his desk ali his time except
the few hours that were devoted to
sleep. One IS a romance, and is entitled
"a Corpse. The other work was finish
ed a few days ago and will be published
either in Russia or in France in the
near future. tt Is entitled Where Is the
Root of the Evil?" and it contains a
garphic description of the prisons, hospi-
tails and lunatic asylumS in Russia, the
authors design being to show how cruelty
are treated by those who have charge
of them. Much more than this, however.
the work contains, for Count TolstCi
avails himself to the utmost of this
golden opportunity to grid at modern so
ciety in his own inimitable trenchant
style.
So grave indeed are the charges of
tyranny, corruption and hypocrisy, which
he brings against all modern govern
ments, and so drastic are the remedies
which he proposes, that the work is
bound to cause a great sensation as soon
as it is published.
Meanwhile the thousands of Americans
who admire Tolstoi can obtain an ade-
quate idea as to the scope and object OF
the work from the following Passages,
which the author permitted a friend to
copy from the manuscript, and which
treats mainly of what TOlsto calls med
ern slavery" Indeed, according to one
report, Modern Slavery will be one of
the titles of the new book. Here are the
extracts.
German Socialists speak of the iron
law of wages. meaning thereby the sum
total of those conditions which render
the oppression of the wage-worker by
the capitalist possible and fatal, and their
intention in using this phrase is to show
that this law is immutable. 7, however,
maintain that there is nothing immuta-
CaDltal
and labor, since they are merely the re-
suit of human laws, which by means of
taxes burden the earth, and mainly priv
ate property, and which therefore can be
repealed by men, since it was men who
enacted them. Slavery, then, is not the
result of either of an iron law or of any
sociological law, but it is the natural re-
suit of human codes.
1.-THE law says that land can belong
to an Individual and can be transmit. ed
from one indivual to another by will or
sale. The law also says that every one
must pay without protest the taxes which
are imposed on him. The law finally
says that possession gives title to land,
or, In other words, that the owner of
property has an absolute legal right
to it, no matter by what means he may
have acquired it
IF these laws did not exist there would
be no slavery.
1--WE have, however, bee me so acc1--
toned to submit to these laws that we
now regard them as essential to human
lie, and never think of questioning their
necessity or their justice. The anc;eats
regarded the laws which kept slaves in
bondage as equitable and sac ed We
md nothing Legitimate IN the laws
Whlch cypress US. Nevertheless lust as
three came in the history of civilization
an hour when men, seeing the mp11rnfl1I
results Of slavery, began to question the
justice and the necessity OF the laws
which maintained it in force, so, too, as
the -eNll results Of the present economic
order become manifest, one may refuse
to consider just and necessary those laws
winch impose taxes on real estate and
personal property, since these laws are
the direct cause of the present con-
demnable economic situation
foI merry men asked if it was Just that
some men should belong to other men
and should not only be debarred from
holding any property themselves, but
should even be oblised to hand over to
their owners the product Of their labor
To-day We MAY ask: Is it just that some
men should be prohibited from deriving
profit from land merely because some
other men are supposed to have the sole
right to it? IS it Just that certain men
should he compelled to sacrifice for the
benefit of others portion of their la
Dor In the form of taxes? Is It just ard
equitable that men should be debaTred
from deriving any profit from land mere
Iy because it is regarded as the properly
of those who do not cultivate it:
ct is pretended that in framing this
law legislators acted on the principle
that property in land is an Indispensable
condition of agricultural prosperity, snd
that, If individual property could not
be transmitted by inheritance, men would
perpetually be driving each other from
the land occupied since no one would be
willing to work or to improve the land
on which he lived. But is that true?
ASK the history Of the past, and study
our own time. History tells us that pro-
perry in. land came into being not In
order that possession of the land might
thus be guaranteed, but IN order that
land, common to all, might be monopo-
lized by the stronger and might be dis
tributed by them among those who could
be of service to them. Encouragement
of agriculture is therefore not the OBJ
Ject of this institution of landed pro-
perty. On the contrary, facts prove that
TINS institution does not in any way
guarantee to the man who cuitiga rates
the land that he will or will not he
deprived of the fruits of his labor.
Ihose who have profted and still pro-
Mt by landed property are the large
land owners, whereas the great majority
OF agriculturists are today in the posi-
tlon OF those who cultivate land which
belongs to others, and from which thosn
VINO do not cultivate it can expel them
whenever they please. In other words
property IN land, as 1t exists today. does
not guarantee to the farmer any aden,;are
p1oht for his labor, but, on the contrary
furnishes others with the means TO de-
prive him of the land after he has chi
uVated it. The laws relating to landed
property, instead of benefting agricuI~
turtsts, render their lot worse than r.
would otherwise be- -
1t is also said that men are bound
TO pay taxes because they are imposed
by common, though, tacit consent and
because they are used for good purposes
and for the profit of the community,
WENT TO WAR FOR BROTHER