The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1906-04-19
GORkY'S VISION.

of Russia have come as a result Of the
visit of Maxim Gorky to this country
To Americans this visit is both ro-
mantle and pathetic. To the Russian
it is Il dream seemingly never to be
realized.
AS man GOrky knows the nation
as few others do. He has lived Russia
as the nation is expressed in the lives
of the people. He is peasant who
has risen to the top OF the ladder not
by reason of geniology running back
to ancestors who boasted of blue blood,
but simply by his own inherent power.
He possessed the ability to observe.
to study and to act
He has seen the wrongs from which
his people have suffered He has
studied the causes which have made
it possible to perpetuate these
wrongs. He knows, furthermore, what
is necessary to be done to relieve the
int0lerable conaition OF the great
r':,sses of the people o. that nation.
He must know how hopeless is the
battle for relief
Like MANY others who have lived
in an age too early for their endow.
ments, Gorky has visions OF a great
social revolution when the millions of
ignorant, credulous and suffering Rus
slams will each. be so self-governed
that he will voluntarily surrender a
part OF his personal freedom for the
benefit of the whole people, SO that
within the free limits still left he may
work and live and act without re-
strictions other than those OF his own
personal capacities.
Americans are inclined to look upon
the earnestness of the dreams of men
like Gorky with amusement, If not
with ridicule. But it should be re-
membered that in this country the lib
erty of the individual is SO great that
it has become commonplace - the
declarations of a few muckrake zeal
OTIS to the contrary.
Not SO in Russia. for with the ex-
ception Of Poland and Finland, and
these SO long ago that it is almost lost
in tradition, the great masses of the
people have never tasted the sweet
ness of individual freedom Their
petitions for redress have been an
swered by the lash, their political zeal
has been cooled by prison walls. Like
wild animals tortured into fury they
have rushed upon their oppressors
only to meet certain death for their
recklessness. The dream seems to be
sweet not to be realized. Is it much
wonder that Russia is seething with
anarchy?
1t must have been a glorious sensa-
ton to Gorky when he first compre-
hended the realization of his ideal
even in strange land whose language
he could not speak or understand.
He has come to America to gather
strength-somehow-for his suffering
and downtrodden people at home. He
hopes to carry back with him knowl-
edge of our institutions and people
that will assist in solving the great
problems that must be mastered in
Russia before there can possibly come
the: political freedom which is the
hope Of the oppressed peasantry.
One thing Gorky has learned al
ready in manner humiliating even
to his friends, is that the individual
ia accountable to the community for
his conduct Gorky's visit will be
marred by the fact that he was ac-
companied by a woman who was not
his wife. In his own land this would
hardly have aroused passing notice.
yet In the land whose social and poll
teal institutions he had come to study.
he found that this fact excluded him
from the hotels even.
If he shall learn that individual
freedom does not mean individual
license. and that in a free country it
is the required duty Of everyone to
work for the good of all. and that
self-restraint is a political virtue. he
will have much to carry back to his
people.
It ia the lack Of these elements that
has made the Russian peasantry 30
easy to crush beneath the iron heel
Of tyranny.
When goaded to desperation by their
oppressors they have turned upon