His father arrived with the rope: “Here,” he said, “is a rope for you! Take hold of it, and I will pull you out. Hold on to it and do not let it slip!” “No, don’t pull yet: tell me first what kind of a thing is a rope?”
His father was not a learned man, but he had his wits about him, so, leaving his foolish question alone, he said: “A rope is a thing with which to pull people out of ditches into which they have fallen.” “Why have they not invented a machine for that? A rope is too simple a thing.” “’T would take time for that,” his father replied, “whereas your salvation is now at hand.” “Time? What kind of a thing is time?” “Time is a thing that I am not going to waste with a fool. Stay there,” his father said, “until I shall return!”
How would it be if all the other verbose talkers were collected and put in the ditch to serve him as companions? Well, it would take a much larger ditch for that.
Yákov Borísovich Knyazhnín. (1742-1791.)
Knyazhnín was born in Pskov, where he received his early education; in St. Petersburg he acquired German, French and Italian, and began to write verses. He served in civil and military government offices. In 1769 he wrote his first tragedy, Dido, which attracted Catherine’s attention to him. He then married Sumarókov’s daughter and devoted himself more especially to literature. Knyazhnín wrote a number of tragedies and comedies: the subject of all of these is taken from Italian and French, thus his Vadím of Nóvgorod is based on Metastasio’s Clemenza di Tito, and the original of Odd People is Destouches’s L’homme singulier. The Vadím of Nóvgorod had a peculiar history. Knyazhnín had great admiration for Catherine and her autocratic rule. In his Vadím he tried to depict the struggle between republican Nóvgorod and the monarchic Rúrik, in which the latter comes out victorious, to the advantage of unruly Nóvgorod. He had written it in 1789, but did not stage it on account of the disturbed condition of Europe under the incipient French Revolution. Two years after his death, in 1793, Princess Dáshkov, the President of the Academy, inadvertently ordered it to be published. The book appeared most inopportunely, at the very time the Revolution had broken forth. The tendency of the tragedy was overlooked, and only the republican utterances of Vadím were taken notice of. The book was ordered to be burnt by the executioner, but as only a few copies could be found in the storeroom of the Academy, the rest having been sold in the meanwhile, they were privately destroyed.
VADÍM OF NÓVGOROD
ACT I., SCENE 2. VADÍM, PRENÉST AND VÍGOR
Vadím. Could Rúrik so transform your spirit that you only weep where your duty is to strike?
Prenést. We burn to follow you, to be glorified for ever, to crush the haughty throne, to resuscitate our land; but though the zeal already burns within our hearts, it sees as yet no means of its fulfilment. Disdaining harsh and laborious days, if needs we must die, we are ready; but that our death be not in vain and could save our beloved land from evil, and that, intent to break the fetters, we tighten them not more in servitude,—we must expect the aid of the immortals, for the gods can give us a favourable opportunity.
Vadím. So we must depend alone upon the gods and ingloriously remain the slaves we are? The gods have given us the opportunity to wrest back freedom, and hearts to dare, and hands to strike! Their aid is within us: what else do you wish? Go, creep, await in vain their thunder, but I alone, boiling with anger, will move to die for you, for I can brook no master! O fate! For three years absent from my country, enticed by victory for its glory I left liberty and happiness within these walls against us erected, and have been hurling pride into the dust. I bear the fruit of my exploits a gift to my nation: but what do I see? Lords who have lost their liberty bent in loathsome slavery before the king, and kissing their yoke under the sceptre. Tell me, how could you, seeing your country’s fall, for a moment prolong your life in shame? And if you could not preserve your liberty,—how could you bear the light and want to live?