" Critics used once to
call our Shakespeare a barbarian, and might equally well give the same
name to Aeschylus or Isaiah. All poets and prophets are in this sense
barbarians, that they will not measure life by the standards of external
"culture." And it is at a time like this, when the material civilization
of Europe seems to have betrayed us and shown the lie at its heart, that
we realize that the poets and prophets are right, and that we must, like
them and like your great writers, once more see life with the simplicity
of the barbarian or the child, if we are to regain our peace and freedom
and build up a better civilization on the ruins of this that is
crumbling.
That task, we trust, will some day lie before us. When at last our
victorious fleets and armies meet together, and the allied nations of
East and West set themselves to restore the well-being of many millions
of ruined homes, France and Great Britain will assuredly bring their
large contributions of good-will and wisdom, but your country will have
something to contribute which is all its own. It is not only because of
your valor in war and your achievements in art, science, and letters
that we rejoice to have you for allies and friends; it is for some
quality in Russia herself, something both profound and humane, of which
these achievements are the outcome and the expression.
You, like us, entered upon this war to defend a weak and threatened
nation, which trusted you, against the lawless aggression of a strong
military power; you, like us, have continued it as a war of self-defense
and self-emancipation.
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