[13] Conversation with M. Paul Boyer. (Le Temps, November 4, 1902.)
[14] The End of a World.
[15] "The cruellest enslavement is to be deprived of the earth, for the slave of a master is the slave of only one; but the man deprived of the land is the slave of all the world." (The Great Crime)
[16] Russia was actually in a somewhat special situation; and although Tolstoy may have been wrong to found his generalisations concerning other European States upon the condition of Russia, we cannot be surprised that he was most sensible to the sufferings which touched him most nearly. See, in The Great Crime, his conversations on the road to Toula with the peasants, who were all in want of bread because they lacked land, and who were all secretly waiting for the land to be restored to them. The agricultural population of Russia forms 80 per cent, of the nation. A hundred million of men, says Tolstoy, are dying of hunger because of the seizure of the soil by the landed proprietors. When people speak to them of remedying their evils through the agency of the Press, or by the separation of Church and State, or by nationalist representation, or even by the eight-hours day, they impudently mock at them:
"Those who are apparently looking everywhere for the means of bettering the condition of the masses of the people remind one of what one sees in the theatre, when all the spectators have an excellent view of an actor who is supposed to be concealed, while his fellow-players, who also have a full view of him, pretend not to see him, and endeavour to distract one another's attention from him."
There is no remedy but that of returning the soil to the labouring people. As a solution of the property question, Tolstoy recommends the doctrine of Henry George and his suggested single tax upon the value of the soil. This is his economic gospel; he returns to it unwearied, and has assimilated it so thoroughly that in his writings he often uses entire phrases of George's.
[17] "The law of non-resistance to evil is the keystone of the whole building. To admit the law of mutual help while misunderstanding the precept of non-resistance is to build the vault without sealing the central portion." (The End of a World.)
[18] In a letter written in 1900 to a friend (Further Letters) Tolstoy complains of the false interpretation given to his doctrine of non-resistance. "People," he says, "confound Do not oppose evil by evil with Do not oppose evil: that is to say, Be indifferent to evil. ..." "Whereas the conflict with evil is the sole object of Christianity, and the commandment of non-resistance to evil is given as the most effectual means of conflict."
[19] The End of a World.
[20] Tolstoy has drawn two types of these "Sectators," one in Resurrection (towards the end) and one in Three More Dead.