"A constitution and freedom of the press. They do not even use the right to form scientific societies. At present there is no studying done at our universities; politics have swallowed up everything, and the radical element has seized the leadership completely. They hope in a few months, by means of demonstrations, and Heaven knows what fateful resources, to attain a constitution, and after that there will always be time enough for study. At present, study, too, would be treason against the cause of freedom. The universities are only political camps awaiting the call to arms and nothing more."
"But in this respect, at least, they must be glad of their independent university courts—that is, that at any rate they punish their youthful misdeeds more leniently than the police."
"No. In the first place, it is only disciplinary matters over which our court has jurisdiction; and then, in the second place, you forget that the students do not at all want to be mildly treated, but to be sacrificed."
"Of course. It is hard to reckon with motives that one scarcely understands. But one thing is still unintelligible to me. It cannot exactly be said that Russia is a radical country in the sense that the whole upper stratum is radical. How is it that the student body, which comes principally from this upper stratum, is so laden with revolutionary tendencies?"
"I might answer you in a French phrase, although it is not particularly flattering to us, 'Le Russe est liberal jusqu'à trente ans, et après—canaille.'[8] The Russian is absolutely not conservative, not even the official. He can mock conservatism while seeking office, but in his own house he remains a free-thinker, and youth, which has not yet learned to cringe and hedge, blushes at the two-facedness of its parentage, and continually reveals the true attitude of the house. Then, with the exception of the high nobility, our whole landowner class is more than liberal. Moreover, from two to three hundred conservative students are to be found at each of the great universities, and they have formed a secret association for the protection of the sacred régime—and it is characteristic that the Novoye Vremya was allowed to print the call to form this secret society, although here in Russia all secret societies are illegal."
"And are not these conservative students dangerous to their fellows?"
"Up to the present they have confined themselves to patriotic demonstrations. They might become dangerous if they once decided to go to lectures—not even then to their fellow-students, but to the professors, who have greater doctrinal freedom, and who also make use of the right to express their opinions, of course within the limits of their special subjects. [Shortly after this interview a professor in Kharkov who had expressed sympathy for the Japanese was actually informed against by the conservative students and disciplined by the authorities, a thing which led to great student demonstrations.] Moreover, there are special spies which keep watch over the professors and students, but luckily they are too illiterate to understand the import of what is said, and therefore can do little damage."
"Are the professors sufficiently in sympathy with each other for the formation of a university esprit de corps?"
"Most certainly. The common suffering, the fact that they are forbidden to take open part in politics draw them together. Where in other places rivalries and differences of opinion occasion dissensions, here there is to be found only one solid whole—oppression is the firm cement. And only in this way is it possible to make some resistance to the absolutism of the police. In open resistance we are quite weak, yes, even defenceless, against the brutality of the régime, but in passive resistance we are almost unconquerable because of our close contact with each other."