2 14 Alexander Petninkevitch, Ph.D., 



To say that Russia might have produced a great deal more in 

 the tield of science than it actually has produced, had the de- 

 velopment of the country been allowed to proceed normallv, is 

 not a mere figure of speech or an excuse, an attempt as it were 

 to find extenuating circumstances for natural shortcomings. In 

 a country where the word "constitution" was struck by the 

 censor even from the pages of learned investigations, where the 

 chief duty of the Secretary of Education was to devise means 

 to prevent the spreading of knowledge, creative w^ork in science 

 w-as more than simply hampered, it w^as often physically impos- 

 sible. Yet a glance at a list of works published by Russian 

 scientists will show the productivity and many-sidedness of the 

 Russian genius. There is scarcely a field of science in which 

 Russians have not done some creditable work, increased the 

 store of our knowledge, cleared up some intricate problem or 

 opened new^ chapters and set forth new questions. 



And all this had to be done in the face of great difficulties of 

 which western institutions have no idea. There was always a 

 lack of funds and a lack of men, a lack of institutions and a 

 lack of young men to be trained for such institutions. The 

 educational system was borrowed from Germany, its negative 

 qualities were intensified w^hile the most important positive quali- 

 ties were partially or completely suppressed. The Russian 

 national character was not taken into account by that system 

 foreign to its spirit which was put as it w^ere into a straight- 

 jacket and had its wings clipped by two most efficient tools in 

 the hands of autocracy — censorship and espionage. Used per- 

 sistently with only occasional short intermissions, during more 

 than one century, and embracing all phases of national and private 

 life, being constantly present in all university recitation halls, 

 laboratories and even private offices, censorship and espionage 

 ruined the relationship between teacher and pupil, afifected the 

 character of the institutions and prevented the normal develop- 

 ment of many a promising youth. 



To understand the ruinous influence of espionage and censor- 

 ship on national character and the productive genius of the 

 people one must have grown up and gone through the schools 

 in Russia. The offices of inspector and his aids in every second- 

 ary school were especially created to control not only the be- 

 havior of pupils in the school, but their life outside of school 



