"He wrote to me in the first place that they have decided to live and labor only for their own province and occupy themselves only with local or provincial affairs, and again they aim at some kind of synthesis of all nationalities, and thirdly they will Polonize nobody."
"But you were only concerned about primers for the children of the petty nobility, who are Polish."
"By them this is already styled Polonization, for it interferes with their 'synthesis.' We know in what that synthesis must end. May the devils take them, together with their diplomacy. But that is not enough! In the end, my ingenious brother informs me that he does not regard himself as a Pole, but only as a Volhynian with Polish culture and that this is his political position. Ah, sir, Stanczyk was wrong when he said that in Poland there are the most doctors. In Poland there are the most politicians. Every average Pole is a second Talleyrand, a second Metternich, a second Bismarck. He never participated in political life, is unacquainted with history, never passed through any schools, and never studied. That is nothing! He is by grace of God! He from nature has a pastille in his brain, of which he thinks that if he only lights it, then all the horse-flies and gnats, which suck our blood will be so hoaxed that they will cease to molest us. And every one is convinced that he alone sees clearly, that he alone has the exclusive measures, and that his diplomacy, county, local, provincial, or whatever you may call it, is a panacea. It never occurs to him, that with such county or local polities, this fatherland, as Yan Casimir said, would go into direptium gentium."
"Sir," said the aged notary to Gronski, pointing to the doctor, "you have pressed in him such a button, that now he will not stop talking until we shall not be able to move hand or limb."
"That is not a button, that is a sore," answered Gronski.
And evidently it was a sore for the doctor, as he was so absorbed that he did not hear what was said about him, and began the following dialogue with his absent brother.
"Ah! So you are not a Pole but only a Volhynian with Polish culture? Very well! Then, in the first place I will tell you that you have repudiated your father, grandfather, and great-grandfather; that you have spat upon their graves; that you have renounced your traditions, your right of existence, that you have grown smaller, that you have deserted your own people and have gone to those who do not want you, who do not invite you and who treat you with contempt; that you hang in the air and you will look prettily under such conditions in your Volhynia. Again, I will tell you that you are not yet a turncoat, since that which you are doing, you do through stupid politics which in consequence of your ignorance you regard as wise, but you have paved the way for future turncoats. Your grandson or great-grandson will renounce Polish culture. And finally, if you say that you are not a Pole, but only a Volhynian, why do you not go back farther, even as far as Darwin? You could with equal justice say that you are not a Pole, but an orang-outang or a pithecanthrope with Polish culture? What? Bah! But you still say that you do not want to Polonize any one? How can you Polonize? Whether with a whip, with prison, by religious compulsion, with school, or with a gag on the native tongue? Tell me! But, if not denying your nationality you would shine with the example of your public Polish virtues, if you would give someone your Polish hunger for liberty, your Polish ability to understand the sufferings of others, your Polish love, your Polish hope, your faith in a better future, and through these reconcile him to Poland, then would you regard such a Polonization as premature, and bad politics? But in such case, I ask you, you dunce, have you anything better to offer, and why are you staying there where you settled? You don't know? And in the end you will not even know who you are. That I will tell you. You, Brother, are a weak character and above all have a weak head."
Here he turned to Gronski:
"This is what I have to say to my brother and why I am riding to him. There is to be some kind of an assembly there, so I will say this, in other words, publicly."
"If you would only go as quickly as possible," exclaimed the notary.