“The era of demoralization has come” – Weekend
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June 14 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Pyotr Lavrov, a historian, philosopher and revolutionary, one of the ideologists of populism. We re-read his works and found out what kind of relationship a moral person enters into with society, what she is obliged to resist and what to maintain in herself.
1
The era of demoralization has begun. From the ranks of selfless fighters for the future of Russia, the tired and disappointed began to lag behind. To the names of some of these yesterday’s fighters, the words had to be added: “apostate”, “traitor”, “traitor”.
2
All complainers about the depravity of time, about the insignificance of people, about stagnation and retrograde movement, should put the question: and you yourself, seeing among the blind, healthy among the sick, what have you done to promote progress?
3
What is needed is not a reminder of the irrevocable past, but the ability to unite into one historical force, a clear understanding of the new tasks facing the developed Russian people, and a selfless determination to fulfill these tasks.
4
Neither literature, nor art, nor science saves from immoral indifference. They do not conclude or condition progress by themselves. They only deliver tools for him. They are gathering strength for him.
5
For the action of force to be manifested, an example is needed. In order for a person to feel not alone, it is necessary for her to know that there is another person who not only understands how hard it is for her and why it is so hard, but also acts against this evil. We need not only a word, we need a deed. We need energetic, fanatical people who risk everything and are ready to sacrifice everything.
6
When a person feels incompleteness, fragmentation, lack, disorder, creativity comes to his aid with its desire to reconcile all contradictions, to supplement all shortcomings.
7
Setting goals and striving for them is just as inevitable, just as natural a fact in human nature as breathing, blood circulation or metabolism.
8
Whoever is indifferent to his life actions does not live morally: he submits to the daily routine and remains a moral indifferentist.
9
Habitual knowledge and habitual reception become dear, not only because they are true and useful, but also because they are habitual. It is a pity for a person to exchange error for truth, and he tries to defend his mistake.
10
If such facts are constantly noticed in the sphere of a developed society, accustomed by upbringing and life to the criticism of facts, then they are all the more common in an undeveloped person. The less scientific criticism, the more often and the cruder the confusion of the real with the imaginary.
eleven
Since there has always been a huge number of individuals in society who, due to a lack of mental development, rank, and energy, needed other individuals, more intelligent, knowledgeable and energetic, to choose living conditions for them, the state system was rooted in the first prenatal and generic human groups, in the first wandering tribes, and is still not at all limited to what are called the political organs of society.
12
Wherever a person, without reasoning, submits to conditions of life not chosen by him, he submits to the state principle.
13
The majority of people, being guided by the rules of morality common to them and always ready to act differently in the event of a change in these rules, remain now alien both to the need for development and to moral life.
14
Part of the world and a slave of nature, man never wanted to confess his slavery. Subject to incessantly unreasonable impulses and accidental circumstances, he never wished to call his impulses directly unreasonable and his actions the result of accidental influences.
15
In the most intimate depths of the soul, we find the desire to hide from ourselves our dependence on the immutable laws of the unconscious substance, to decorate with something in front of us the precariousness and inconsistency of our actions.
16
It is not to be horrified that the progress of a minority has come at a cost, but perhaps that it has cost so much, and that so little has been done for that price. If the minority had earlier and more diligently taken care of spreading around itself the development acquired in the field of culture and thought, then the number of lost lives and labor would not have been so great.
17
Most of humanity still finds the torment of animals completely innocent. A significant part of humanity looks at a woman and children as the property of the father of the family. Slavery is still very widespread, not only in fact, but also in the belief of peoples.
18
For the actions of most people, selfishness is the main engine. But nevertheless, having allowed somewhere a denial, a complete absence of justice, we recognize it as an accident, which may or may not exist, while it is and should be an indistinguishable property of a person.
19
It is remarkable that people of weak character and therefore incapable of finding in themselves a solid basis for evaluating their dignity often become ready to make the most cruel sacrifices to this desire to be highly appreciated by other people.
20
Due to the lack of development of self-consciousness, quite a lot of individuals are still at this stage, which is in no way higher than cattle, and perhaps lower, because the animal does not have the opportunity to get out of its position.
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