The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-09-15
BY SOL AUERBACH.

Tor L had come to confess that
it was not a real life, only the semb-
lance of one; that its superfluous
luxury prevented the possibility of
understanding life, and that in or
der to do so I must know, not an
exceptional parasitic life, but the
simple life of the working classes,
the life which fashions that of the
world, and gives it the meaning
which the working classes accept.
The simple laboring men around me
we're the Russian people, and I
armed to this people and to the
meaning which it gives to life"
Leo Tolstoy wrote this in "My
Confessions" the book which marks
5he pivot point of his development,
written after a brave and frank
scrutiny of the life and ideas of
his class and himself. He had come
20 that point in his life when such
4 serious and sincere nature as his
own could no longer tolerate the
meaningless and parasitic life of
he Russian nobility. He had asked
himself two questions: What is the
end of all this pleasure seeking,
his meaningless hopping from one
pleasure to another, this continual
life of passive acceptance without
questioning of purpose and good ?
in this he saw nothing but decad-
ence, death, decay, palatial edifice
of glass pleasures built upon the
backs of the masses.
From the first question it was but
a step to the second: If this life of
personal pleasure means nothing,
is useless, how then can l be of use
10 society? 1t is one thing to see
The insignificance of the individual
N the complex structure of society;
is quite another to substitute for
he meaningless and decadent ideo-
ogy of a parasitic class an ALIEN
racing, healthy and constructive
way of looking at things. In the
masses Tolstoy saw a daily life of
struggle and suffering, an existence
Dotted in the very soil of Russia,
massive, bulky, sturdy as an oak,
cushing out its branches and gen.
rating its sap in spite of the op-
,ressive weeds of a czarist regime.
and the sun-dimming painted win
dows of the church.
In a certain sense we can say
hat Tolstoy was class conscious and
ook his stand with the masses
J gainst the mobile" oppressors Of
t 1arist Russia. With the formula
{ ion of his point of view Tolstoy
crenounced the culture and institu.
lions of his class. The art of what
we would call the bourgeoisie was
o him decadent, swimming in the
uices of its own decayed body. He
aw in it only a refined way of ex-
PRESSING "the feeling of pride, the
ceiling of sexual desire, and the feel.
ing of WEAKNESS of life" Contrast
his culture with the simple handi-
crafts and life of the working and
peasant masses and one sees the
difference between life that will
build the culture of the future and
a life that is building its own cof-
fin. Free the slaves of capital,
and it will be impossible to produce
such refined art"
Although Tolstoy in one sense
was class conscious-in a negative
way by his denunciation of the life
Of a parasitic ruling classic was
not possessed Of that class consci-
BUSINESS which is constructively re-
volutionary. His was the point of
view of a rebel artist not of a pro-
letarian revolutionist. His whole re-
action to the miserable social con-
ditions of Russia was that of
highly sensitive and realistic indi-
vidual. In the Russian peasant he
saw patient acceptance of his lot,
chronic passivism, a restraining
quietism, deep religious sense. So
great was Tolstoy's desire to achieve
peace of mind in a life that served
some purpose that he accepted these
traits as part Of his philosophy,
incorporating the bad nature of the
Russian masses as we'll as the good.
If he had been a more penetrating
social philosopher, he would have
seen that these traits were only
transient and temporary, that they
had been instilled into the masses
as means of defense against CEN
turtles of oppression. But Tolstoy's
change was so emotional and so ex-
IRENE, his desire to live the life Of
the masses so great, that he COM
mitted the fault that he had charged
10 the art of the ruling classes -
I he placed the beautiful above the
[ good" The simple words reputed
Christ and their docile ineffective
acceptance by the toiling masses
who sought relief in dreams when
it could not be obtained any other
way, was beautiful to the soil-root-
I'd mind of Tolstoy. He preached
passivism, simple religion, brother
hood of man, and sonship in God.