Bernardin de St. Pierre

by Arvède Barine

He entered the army with the greatest ease, owing, as it happened, to a misunderstanding. They were just in the middle of the Seven Years' War, and a great personage to whom Bernardin had applied mistook him for somebody else and without any further investigation gave him a commission in the Engineers. He went through the campaign of 1760, fell out with his superior officers, and was dismissed. On his return to France, having been to see his father, his stepmother made him feel that he was not wanted, and he returned to Paris as destitute and lonely as it is possible to be. Youth takes these things to heart, and by reason of them bears a grudge against the world and life.

The following year he succeeded in being sent to Malta, quarrelled with his superiors and with his comrades, and was shelved. From his return from Malta we may date the first of the innumerable memorials he wrote upon all subjects—administrative, political, commercial, military, moral, scientific, educational, philanthropic, and utopian—with which he never ceased from that time to overwhelm the ministers and their offices, his friends and protectors; in fact, the whole universe, and which made many people look upon him as a plague. One cannot with impunity undertake to be a reformer and to make the happiness of the human race Bernardin was eager to point out to men in office the mistakes and faults in their administration, and to suggest innovations in the interests of the public good, and he was unaffectedly astonished at their ingratitude. He claimed recompense for his good advice, and received no answer; he insisted, got angry, and ended by exasperating the most kindly disposed, even his old friend Hennin, Chief Clerk in the Foreign Office, who was obliged to write to him one day: "You deceive yourself sir, the King owes you nothing, because you have not acted by his orders. Your memorials, however useful they may be, do not in the least entitle you to ask favours from the King as a matter of right." Such lessons, only too well deserved, irritated the simple-minded petitioner, who had struck out the forgiveness of injuries from amongst the duties of philanthropy. "I have always needed the courage," he said, "to forgive an insult, do what I will the scar remains, unless the occasion arises for returning good for evil; for any one under an obligation to me is as sacred in my sight as a benefactor." In the midst of his self-torment he began again, and his affairs went from bad to worse.

Meanwhile he had to live. In the ministry they gave him no hope whatever of being restored to his rank. He had written to all his relations to ask for help, and had received nothing but refusals. He had given lessons in mathematics and lost his pupils. The baker refused to give him credit any longer, and his landlady threatened to turn him out of doors. There was no other resource left to him but to found his kingdom, which, upon reflection, he had converted into a republic. It was to this that he devoted himself without further delay.

He no longer thought it essential that it should be an island; any desert would suffice, provided it had a fertile soil and a good climate. He fixed his choice upon the shores of the Sea of Aral, and at once set about his preparations for departure; which consisted in taking his books to the second-hand bookseller, and his clothes to the old-clothes man, and in borrowing right and left a few crowns. He thus scraped together a few sovereigns, and took the diligence to Brussels, whence be counted on reaching Russia and the Sea of Aral. Why Russia? Why the Sea of Aral? He has given his reasons in a pamphlet, in which he goes back to the Scythian migration, to Odin and Cornelius Nepos, and which explains nothing, unless it is that Bernardin de Saint-Pierre became almost a visionary when his hobby was in question. Here are the reasons which he gives for his choice: "If there were some place upon earth, under a bright sky, where one could find at one and the same time, honour, riches, and society, all due to the security of possession, that place would soon be filled with inhabitants. This happy country is to be found on the east coast of the Caspian Sea; but the Tartars who inhabit it have only made of it a desert." That is all. On the other hand, a note at the bottom of the page shows us where the future legislator had sought his models, reserving to himself the liberty to improve upon them. "The English peopled Pennsylvania with no other invitation than this: He who shall here plant a tree shall gather the fruits thereof. That is the whole spirit of the law." This note was the reply to a famous apostrophe in the Discours sur l'inégalité of J. J. Rousseau.

"The first man who, having enclosed a territory, ventured to say this is mine, and who found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society. How many crimes, wars, murders, miseries and horrors, would he not have spared the human race who should have pulled up the stakes, filled in the ditch, and cried to his fellows, 'Beware of listening to this impostor; you are lost if you forget that the fruits of the earth are for all, and that the earth belongs to no man.'"

One might point out other disagreements between the Discours sur l'inégalité and the pamphlet upon the colony of the Sea of Aral, but they all bear upon questions of detail. Jean Jacques and Bernardin agree at bottom as to the end to aim at and the path to follow. Young Saint-Pierre was already and for ever a disciple of Rousseau. He steeped himself in his philosophy, in anticipation of the day when he was to come to him for lessons in sentiment. Master and pupil both believed that our ills come from society. Nature arranged everything for our happiness, and man was good; if we are wicked and unhappy the fault is in ourselves, who have provoked the evil by disregarding her laws. One can easily see the consequences of these misanthropical views. As we have been the authors of our own unhappiness and know where we have been mistaken, there is certainly a remedy. It rests with us to overcome most of our sufferings by reforming society, and changing our laws and our morality. Humanity only needs a clear-sighted and courageous guide, who would dare to fling in its face its follies and cruelties—who would bring it back into the right path. Rousseau was this guide in words and on paper; Saint-Pierre wished to become the same in deed and in fact. He purposed to put into practice what his century was dreaming of, and that is why he set out one fine night for a fabulous country. One may maintain that he could have found other and more useful ways of employing his time, but, at least, his way was not commonplace or egotistical.

He travelled as an apostle, solely occupied with his mission, trusting to Providence to bring him with his 150 francs to the feet of Peter III.; for it was from the Emperor of Russia that he meant to ask help and protection to found his ideal republic, by which should be demonstrated the vast inferiority of monarchies. He never doubted but that the Czar would share his zeal, then why disturb himself about the means of accomplishing his design? Had he not in old times travelled with brother Paul without money and without thought for the morrow? Had he come to any harm from it? What people gave to the mendicant friar for the love of God, they would give to him for the love of humanity. And so it turned out. He arrived in Russia after having spent his last crown at the Hague. His journey had been a perpetual miracle. One lent him money, another lodged him, a third introduced him to others because of his good looks. At Amsterdam they even offered him a situation and a wife, which he did not think it right to accept because of his republic. He felt that he owed a duty to his people.

He landed at St. Petersburg with six francs in his pocket, and the miracle continued. He did not dine every day, thank heaven! or the romance would have had no further interest. But on the eve of dying of hunger he always encountered some generous person who, like his godmother, thought him interesting. He must indeed have been charming, this fine young fellow, full of fire and good faith, starting out from his garret to regenerate the world. So much so indeed that, passed on from one to another, from introduction to introduction, he arrived at last in the train of a general at Moscow, where the court then was, received a commission as sub-lieutenant of Engineers, and replaced the clothes sold to the old-clothes man in Paris by a brilliant uniform. When his new friends saw him in his scarlet coat with black facings, his fawn-coloured waistcoat, his white silk stockings, his beautiful plume, and his glittering sword, they foretold a great fortune for him. One of them called him cousin, and offered to present him to the Empress Catherine, whom the Revolution of 1762 had just placed upon the throne. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre was transported with joy at this proposal. It was only four months since he had quitted France, and he already neared his goal. Providence evidently watched over his republic.