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Title: Two Wars Author: Leo Tolstoy Date: 1898 Language: en Topics: war, religion Source: Original text from http://www.revoltlib.com/?id=10508, 2021. From The Clarion, November 19, 1898.
Christendom has recently been the scene of two wars. One is now
concluded, whereas the other still continues; but they were for a time
being carried on simultaneously, and the contrast they present is very
striking. The first—the Spanish-American war—was an old, vain, foolish,
and cruel war, inopportune, out-of-date, barbarous, which sought by
killing one set of people to solve the question as to how and by whom
another set of people ought to be governed.
The other, which is still going on, and will end only when there is an
end of all war, is a new, self-sacrificing, holy war, which was long ago
proclaimed (as Victor Hugo expressed it at one of the congresses) by the
best and most advanced—Christian—section of mankind against the other,
the coarse and savage section. This war has recently been carried on
with especial vigor and success by a handful of Christian people—the
Dukhobors of the Caucasus—against the powerful Russian government.
The other day I received a letter from a gentleman in Colorado—Jesse
Goldwin—who asks me to send him ". . . a few words or thoughts
expressive of my feelings with regard to the noble work of the American
nation, and the heroism of its soldiers and sailors." This gentleman,
together with an overwhelming majority of the American people, feels
perfectly confident that the work of the Americans—the killing of
several thousands of almost unarmed men (for, in comparison with the
equipment of the Americans, the Spaniards were almost without arms)—was
beyond doubt a ​"noble work"; and he regards the majority of those who,
after killing great numbers of their fellow-creatures, have remained
safe and sound, and have secured for themselves an advantageous
position, as heroes.
The Spanish-American War—leaving out of account the atrocities committed
by the Spaniards in Cuba, which served as a pretext for it—is very like
this: An old man, infirm and childish, brought up in the traditions of a
false honor, challenges, for the settlement of some misunderstanding, a
young man, in full possession of his powers, to a boxing-match. And the
young man, who, from his antecedents and professed sentiments, ought to
be immeasurably above such a settlement of the question, accepts the
challenge. Armed with a club, he then throws himself upon this infirm
and childish old man, knocks out his teeth, breaks his ribs, and
afterwards enthusiastically relates his great deeds to a large audience
of young men like himself, who rejoice and praise the hero who has thus
maimed the old man.
Such is the nature of the first war, which is occupying the attention of
the whole Christian world. Of the other no one speaks; hardly any one
knows about it.
This second war may be described as follows: The people of every nation
are being deluded by their rulers, who say to them, "You, who are
governed by us, are all in danger of being conquered by other nations;
we are watching over your welfare and safety, and consequently we demand
of you annually some millions of rubles—the fruit of your labor—to be
used by us in the acquisition of arms, cannon, powder, and ships for
your defense; we also demand that you yourselves sall enter
institutions, organized by us, where you will become senseless particles
of a huge machine—the army—which will be under our absolute control. On
entering this army you will cease to be men with wills of your own; you
will simply do what we require of you. But what we wish, above all else,
is to exercise dominion; the means by which we dominate is killing,
therefore we will instruct you to kill."
​Notwithstanding the obvious absurdity of the assertion that people are
in danger of being attacked by the governments of other states, who, in
their turn, affirm that they—in spite of all their desire for peace—find
themselves in precisely the same danger; notwithstanding the humiliation
of that slavery to which men subject themselves by entering the army;
notwithstanding the cruelty of the work to which they are summoned,—men
nevertheless submit to this fraud, give their money to be used for their
own subjugation, and themselves help to enthralled others.
But now there come people who say: "What you tell us about the danger
threatening us, and about your anxiety to guard us against it, is a
fraud. All the states are assuring us that they desire peace, and yet at
the same time all are arming themselves against the others. Moreover,
according to that law, which you yourselves recognize, all men are
brothers, and it makes no difference whether one belongs to this state
or to that; therefore the idea of our being attacked by other nations,
with which you try to frighten us, has no terrors for us; we regard it
as a matter of no importance. The essential thing, however, is that the
law given to us by God and recognized even by you who are requiring us
to participate in killing, distinctly forbids, not killing only, but
also every kind of violence. Therefore we cannot, and will not, take
part in your preparations for murder, we will give no money for the
purpose, and we will not attend the meetings arranged by you with the
object of perverting men's minds and consciences, and transforming them
into instruments of violence, obedient to any bad man who may choose to
make use of them."
This constitutes the second war. It has long been carried on by the best
men of the world against the representatives of brute force, and has of
late flamed up with special intensity between the Dukhobors and the
Russian government. The Russian government has made use of all the
weapons it had at command—police measures for making arrests, for
prohibiting ​people moving from place to place, for forbidding all
intercourse with one another, the interception of letters, espionage,
the prohibition to publish in the newspapers information about anything
concerning the Dukhobors, calumnies of them printed in the papers,
bribery, flogging, imprisonment, and the ruin of families.
The Dukhobors have, on their part, employed their one religious weapon,
viz., gentle intelligence and patient firmness; and they say: "One must
not obey man rather than God. Therefore, whatever you may do to us, we
cannot and will not obey you."
Men praise the heroes of the savage Spanish-American war, who, in their
desire to distinguish themselves before the world, and to gain reward
and fame, have slain great numbers of men, or have died while engaged in
killing their fellow-creatures. But no one speaks or even knows about
the heroes of the war against war, who— unseen and unheard—have died and
are now dying under the rod, in foul prison cells or in painful exile,
and who, nevertheless, to their last breath, stand firm by goodness and
truth.
I knew dozens of these martyrs who have already died, and hundreds more
who, scattered all over the world, are still suffering martyrdom for the
truth.
I knew Drozhin, a peasant teacher, who was tortured to death in a penal
battalion; I knew another, Izumtchenko (a friend of Drozhin), who, after
being kept for some time in a penal battalion, was banished to the other
end of the world. I knew Olkhovikof, a peasant who refused military
service, and was consequently sent to a penal battalion, and then, while
on board a steamer which was transporting him into exile, converted
Sereda, the soldier who had him in charge. Sereda, understanding what
Olkhovikof said to him as to the sinfulness of military service, went to
his superiors and said, like the ancient martyrs; "I do not wish to be
among the torturers; let me join the martyrs." And forthwith they began
to torture him, sent him to a penal battalion, and afterwards exiled him
to the ​province of Yakutsk. I knew dozens of Dukhobors, of whom many
have died or become blind, and yet they would not yield to demands which
are contrary to the divine law.
The other day I read a letter from a young Dukhobor, who has been sent
alone to a regiment stationed in Samarkand. Again, those same demands on
the part of the officers, the same persuasion from the chaplain, the
same threats and entreaties, and always the same simple and irresistible
replies: "I cannot do what is opposed to my belief in God."
"Then we will torture you to death."
"That is your business. You do your work and I will do mine."
And this youth of twenty, forsaken of all, in a strange place,
surrounded by men who are hostile to him, amid the rich, the powerful,
and the educated, who are concentrating all their energies on the task
of bringing him to subjection, does not submit, but still perseveres in
his heroic deed.
But men say: "These are useless victims; these people perish, but the
order of life will remain the same." This, I believe, is just what was
said with regard to the sacrifice of Christ, as well as of all the other
martyrs to truth. The men of our time, especially the learned, have
grown so coarse that they, owing to their coarseness, are even unable to
understand the significance and effect of spiritual force. A shell with
250 puds of dynamite, fired at a crowd of living men—this they
understand and recognize as a force; but thought, truth, which has been
realized and practiced in the life, even to martyrdom, which has now
become accessible to millions this, according to their conception, is
not a force, because it makes no noise, and one cannot see broken bones
and pools of blood. Learned men (true, it is those whose learning is
misdirected) are using all the power of erudition to prove that mankind
lives like a herd of cattle, that man is guided by economic
considerations alone, and that his intellect is given him merely for
amusement. But governments well ​know what it is that rules the world,
consequently—guided by the instinct of self-preservation—they are
undoubtedly chiefly concerned about the manifestation of spiritual
forces, upon which forces depend their existence or their ruin.
And this is precisely the reason why all the energies of the Russian
government were, and still continue to be, exerted to render the
Dukhobors harmless, to isolate them, to banish them beyond the frontier.
Notwithstanding all these efforts, however, the struggle of the
Dukhobors has opened the eyes of millions.
I know hundreds of military men, old and young, who, owing to the
persecution of the gentle, industrious Dukhobors, have begun to have
doubts as to the legality of their occupation. I know people who have,
for the first time, begun to meditate on life and the meaning of
Christianity only after seeing or hearing about the life of these
people, and the persecutions to which they have been subjected.
And the government that is tyrannizing over millions of people knows
this, and feels that it has been struck to the very heart.
Such is the nature of the second war which is being waged in our times,
and such are its consequences. And not to the Russian government alone
are these consequences of importance; every government founded upon
violence and upheld by armies is wounded in the same way by this weapon.
Christ said, "I have conquered the world." And, indeed, He has conquered
the world, if men would but learn to believe in the strength of the
weapon given by Him.
And this weapon is the obedience of every man to his own reason and
conscience. This, indeed, is so simple, so indubitable, and binding upon
every man. "You wish to make me a participator in murder; you demand of
me money for the preparation of weapons; and want me to take part in the
organized assembly of murderers," says the reasonable man—he who has
neither sold nor obscured his conscience. "But I ​profess that law—the
same that is also professed by you—which long ago forbade not murder
only, but all hostility also, and therefore I cannot obey you."
And it is just by this simple means, and by it alone, that the world is
being conquered.
November, 1898.