The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1905-01-24

avoiding the unnecessary Colhplleotivh
Of our judicial syst EN-.
10 All Quiet at the Russian Capital
According to a telegram from St.
Petersburg, the instruction is sup
pressed So were We told some seventy
years ago that order reens in War
saw; and, unhappily for the brave
Polish people. order Of the kind con-
templated by the author of that phrase
is reigning in Warsaw to-day. Must
we then conclude that the Cars sub
jects are doomed forever to witness
innocence cruciiied and crime tri-
umphant? Is this the lesson to be
drawn, not only from Sundays tragedy,
but from the whole dark history Of
Russia under the House OF Romanoh?
Before we make any deductions, let
us try TO get the facts right. On Sun
day, Jan. %. not even the semblance
OF an instruction took place in the
Russian capital What occurred was
peaceful and confding attempt TO present
humble petition to the ruler whom
the petitioners had been taught 10 think
of as their Little Father but who
on his part was skulking in some hiding
place. efraid or ashamed TO look his
subjects in the face Lured into the
SQUIRE before the Winter Palace, and
then moved down by grapeshot and
trampled under foot by cavalry the
harmless and pious believers in their
sovereigns paternal affection learned
how, according to the Russian official
version OF the Bible, "a father pitch
his children Such are the facts. and,
despite the desperate eff orts Of ST. Peters
burg censors TO conceal or minimize the
truth. they have already electrified Mos
cow, where the sturdy old Muscovite
stock survives, and within a week they
will be known and eXecrated through
the length and breadth of the Russian
Empire.
We repeat that what St. Petersburg
witnessed on Sunday was not an in
surrection, but an unprovoked and
atrocious massacre, a result of which,
no doubt a wholesome one, is that the
patient, loyal, devoted Russian people
no longer possess a Car in the ira
ditional tender, venerable sense OF the
name. OF course, they never really
possessed one; but for three hundred
years they have dwelt in a FOOLS para
disc, not content, but meek, resigned
and trustful Now the dream, the hope,
the faith are gone.
/ There are those who will tell Nicho-
Las IL. that peoples affection is not
worth keeping, that the rebble must be
ruled by fear and that so ong as he
has at his disposal machine guns and
the rifles Of his legions il matters not
that he reads hatred and vengeance in
his subjects eyes. The story Of the
/ French Revolution has sometimes been
misconstrued in the same curiously
| myopic way We are told that the
| French dncien regime would never have
| been overthrow had IL found so ruthless
| a defender as the young BoNAPARTE
| showed himself 10 be when at the bid
| Ing of the Convention he slaughtered
the Paris Sections. Tho propounders
| Of this paradox forget that the Conven-
7 ton was night, whereas the dncten regime
was wrong, and that while the latter
| had no moral force 10 back il, behind
the former were arrayed the heart and
! conscience OF France.
! Is il wisdom or folly TO assert thar God
is always on the side Of the strongest
! battalions, as those obviously assume
who tell us that the Russian autocrat is
invincble so long as he can rely upon
his arny7
Is not this equivalent 10 saying that the
brain is mightier than the soul? That
( the arch-fend can vanquish the arch
angel? Yet it was but yesterday that We
/ saw the fortifcations Of Port Arthur,
/ proclaimed impregnable as icing the
consummate product Of modern en-
gineer,ng skill, equipped, too, with
the most redoubtable artillery and
bris;ling with machine guns, cap
tured by Japanese infantry who
brought to the seemingly unequal
contest those weapons Of the dauntless
heart, dsdair Of death, insensibilitv to
pain, and courage never to submit or
yield, and what is else not TO he over
come
Besides, they beg the question who
assume that in a struggle with his people
an autoorat can rely upon his army.
Soldiers and subjects are indissolubly
blended, and it is madness to suppose
that they will long cut each others
Threats in the interest of a despot. Who
uaa /, capfitrad tho Basfii % Not the
Paris populace, but the Gardes Fran
cdises, who had been drawn up in the
square before the fortress for the main
tenance Of order, but who, when they
saw body of alien cavalry, with sabres
drawn, prepared TO cut down unaFped