88 RUSSIA THEN AND NOW 



He was not the first of the world's great reformers 

 and lovers of humanity to lose heart and to experience 

 spells of despair. Moses and Elijah and Jesus and 

 others had their hours of agony, and prayed that the 

 end might come, and deliver them from their hopeless 

 labours. And many who, like Tolstoy, closed their 

 eyes in the belief that they had utterly failed loomed 

 large in subsequent ages among the greatest of the 

 world's benefactors. 



Tolstoy has not failed. He succeeded better than 

 he knew. His pathetic death revealed the vast num- 

 ber of followers he had in his own country and in 

 all parts of the world. And had he cared to inquire, 

 he might have known it before his death. He could 

 have seen it from the fact that more books of his were 

 sold than of all other Russian authors combined. He 

 could have seen it in the vast crowds that gathered all 

 along the line, to catch a glimpse of him, when on his 

 journey, a few years ago, to the Crimea, in search of 

 health. He could have seen it in the deputations of 

 sympathizers that waited upon him, and in the streams 

 of congratulatory letters and telegrams that rushed in 

 upon him till suppressed after his excommunica- 

 tion. He could have seen it in the Tolstoyan societies 

 among the students of almost all the Russian univer- 

 sities and among other bodies. He could have seen it 

 among the considerable number of landlords, who 

 made conscientious efforts at following his life, and at 

 adopting his mode of dealing with peasants and la- 

 bourers. Were the yoke of autocracy removed, there 

 would arise in Russia an army of Tolstoyans as vast 



