of the body this life ceases to exist, but the divine spiritual life remains. Death is therefore not annihilation but merely the emancipation of the spirit, its introduction to a new and unknown state of existence, to another form of manifestation of the divine spiritual essence. The more a man endeavours to live the life of the spirit the nearer his approach to the eternal and the less the significance of death. But it is impossible for the human intellect to conceive any form of existence outside space and time. So far therefore as immortality implies a resurrection of the body Tolstoy denies it; so far as it implies an individual consciousness of the soul he states we can predicate nothing of it. There are two doctrines of life. One of these doctrines, the source of all error, consists in believing that the personal life of man is one of his essential attributes. The other doctrine, that taught by Jesus, is that the whole purpose of our personal life lies in the fulfilment of the will of God.
Before attempting to define the powers and position of an author, it is best to pass in review the works which have led to his present as a reputation. Tolstoy the writer is a guide of unusual Tolstoy Writer. fa i thfulness to Tolstoy the man. The gradual evolu tion of the reformer and preacher out of the brilliant novelist is described in no pages so clearly as in his own. Childhood (1852), Boyhood (1854) and Youth (1855-1857) - Tolstoy's first literary efforts - may be regarded as semi-autobiographical studies; if not in detail, at least in the wider sense that all his books contain pictures, more or less accurate, of himself and his own experiences. No plot runs through them; they simply analyse and describe with extraordinary minuteness the feelings of a nervous and morbid boy, a male Marie Bashkirtseff. They are tales rather of the development of the thoughts than of the life of a child, with a pale background of men and events. The distinct charm lies in the sincerity with which this development is represented. We are introduced by the child, Nicholas Irtenyev, to a number of characters one after the other - father, mother, grandmother, tutor, servants and serfs; and are led by him from the father's study to the morningroom, and so on to the kitchen and the housekeeper's closet; and we catch, as in a magic crystal, the lifelike scenes on his waking - in the schoolroom - at his mother's side. But the apparently unconscious change of the child's mind into that of the youth - his budding thoughts, hopes, fears - form the true drama of the story. The Cossacks (1863), written round the theory that culture is an enemy to happiness, was followed by War and Peace (1864-1869), which has been justly. called a Russian epic. Within its pages Tolstoy has marshalled a panoramic array of kings, princes and nobles as they lived and moved during the times of the great Napoleonic wars. There are so many figures in the picture, so much kaleidoscope colour and movement, that the spectator often finds it difficult to follow the thread of the narrative. The leading characters principally belong to the highest Russian society, whose circle - with its inflexible code of laws and customs, and a vitiated moral atmosphere affecting each member of it in a greater or less degree - links them together. The interest centres not so much in any single person as in the groups formed by four leading families of the " grand monde " - the Rostovs, Bezouchovs, Volkonskys and the Kouragines - all bound together by common aims and interests. The men are eager to make a name and enjoy life; the women seek pleasure in gossip and romance. Peter Bezouchov and Prince Andre, with natures essentially different but united by a love of truth, are the exceptions to this rule. Peter Bezouchov is one of Tolstoy's finest characterizations, drawn with a masterly hand. He is the embodiment of all that is good and bad in the Russian temperament. On the one side there is the striving after an ideal and a capacity for self-sacrifice, on the other an absence of firmness and balance. Like Tolstoy himself, he is always in doubt as to what is right and what is wrong, as to the meaning of life and death, and, like Tolstoy at that time, can as yet find no answer to these riddles. While Peter Bezouchov is a typical Russian, a very Tolstoy, Prince Andre if a less striking, is a more lovable personality. Upright and noble-minded, he yet is unable to cast off the chains of custom which have held him from childhood. He too is constantly seeking mental rest and finding none. The lovestory of Andre and Natasha Rostov, which runs through the novel, is a poem in itself. Natasha is almost the only heroine Tolstoy has given us who wins our affections; but even she, after many transitions, sinks to the level of the Hausfrau, with no aim beyond the propagation and nurture of the race. It must be borne in mind that in War and Peace Tolstoy winged his shafts not at men generally but at that particular section of society to which he himself by birth and association belonged.
A long period of silence followed the publication of this novel, during which the world heard little of him. At length in 1873 he "Anna issued the first parts of Anna Karenina. It is without ." doubt his greatest literary production. The area of Karenina time and space in it, as in the preceding book, is large, but it has more continuity of action, and the principal characters are kept well in the foreground. It is a study of modern Russian life, in which the normal passivity of unsympathetic conjugal relations is sharply contrasted with the transient omnipotence of passion and deep love. The hero and heroine are Count Wronsky, a young soldier in a crack regiment, and Anna Karenina, the wife of an important official in the political world of St Petersburg. The parts of secondary heroine and hero are filled by Kitty Cherbatzky and her lover and ultimate husband, Levine. The central figure is of course Anna herself, an elegant and fascinating " mondaine." She is honest, frank and well endowed by nature, and has an innate striving after truth and beauty in art and in life, but her early marriage with Karenina (who is double her age, reserved and taciturn), while socially advantageous, has dulled and stunted her ideals. Ignorant of the meaning of love, she despises it, and it is not till she meets Wronsky that she realizes to the full the emptiness of her existence. Wronsky, young, handsome, impassioned, recognizing no principle but his own desires, offers her the rich wine of life at a draught. She tastes it, after scant hesitation; and then, flinging away her worldly position, deserting her husband and child, she drains it to the dregs, only to find that poison lies in the cup. Anna and Wronsky have no true ideal to cling to. He, as their passion cools, finds the tie irksome and a hindrance to his career. She grieves for her lost and dearly-loved son, and frets as she sees that Wronsky's devotion is waning, recognizing too late that he loved her chiefly for vanity's sake, that they are slipping daily asunder, and growing displeasing to each other. Her past life is closed to her, the future opens like an abyss. The crisis has come, and swiftly obeying the impulse of her despair she seizes on death as her only weapon for wounding Wronsky and cutting the hopeless knot of her life. This pitiful end is led up to step by step with microscopic truth and insight, into the springs of human action. In the married life of Kitty and Levine, on the other hand, Tolstoy describes a state of happiness of a material nature - disagreements easily bridged over, and mutual interest in their children and the pleasures of the country. Levine is the Tolstoy of fiction. The improvement and development of his estates, the life of a country squire, fail to satisfy him. The death of his brother, the birth of his child, awaken his mind to the problems of existence, and he is plunged in melancholy. Finally, relief comes to him with the words of a peasant who bids him " live for his soul and for his God." Thereupon Levine exclaims, " I have discovered nothing. I have simply opened my eyes to what I knew already; I have come to the recognition of that power which formerly gave me life and which renews life in me to-day. I am freed from error; I recognize my master." And the novel ends with the effacing of the intellect in a cloud of happy mysticism.
The Kreutzer Sonata, published in 1890, created a profound impression. Many who were previously unacquainted with Tolstoy's work read this story of love, jealousy and revenge, and "Kreutzer were dumbfounded [by its boldness. It is a startling Sonat a. " advance upon Family Happiness, published thirty .
years earlier. Society generally, and Russian society in particular, is ruthlessly condemned for its views on marriage and its attitude towards the vexed question of the relations between man and woman. Marriage, Tolstoy says, can only be condoned if spiritual sympathy exists, and then only as the means to the continuance of the race; otherwise it is a breach of true morality. The " motive " of the Sonata is that the ideal we should strive after is a life where the spiritual penetrates and pervades everything, and where all that is carnal is eliminated. But in the " Sequel " to the Sonata Tolstoy adds that great ideals are always unattainable, and affirms that no man can know, whilst yet striving, how nearly he approaches them. He is only conscious of his deviations.
The views of culture forming the basis of The Cossacks are yet further elaborated in What is Art? (1898), a sweeping criticism of the philosophy of aesthetics, to which he had devoted "What i s fifteen years of thought. He dismisses as inadequate Art? „ the theories which define art as the pursuit of beauty, whether beauty be regarded with Shelley and Hegel as an approximation to archetypal perfection, and thus allied to God and goodness, or with Kant as that which gives disinterested pleasure. Tolstoy sets forth his own view that art is a human activity which aims at the transmission of emotion. He proceeds to demand that the emotion shall be actually felt and shall belong to the highest feelings to which men can rise. True art must appeal to the religious perception of the brotherhood of man, and it must find universal response. He asserts that exclusive art is bad art, and that such subjects as sexual love, patriotism and religious devotion should be avoided.
(C. H. W.)
TOLSTOY, PETR ANDREEVICH, Count (1645-1729), Russian statesman, was the son of the okolmnichy Andrei Vasilevich Tolstoy. He served in 1682 as chamberlain at the court of Theodore III. Miscalculating the strength of the tsarevna Sophia (q.v.) he became one of her most energetic supporters, but contrived to join the other, and winning, side just before the final catastrophe. For a long time Peter kept his latest recruit at arm's length; but when, in 1697, Tolstoy volunteered to go to Venice to learn Italian and ship-building, Peter could not resist the subtle flattery implied in such a proposal from a middle-aged Muscovite noble. In November 1701 Tolstoy was appointed the first regularly accredited Russian ambassador to the Porte, and more than justified the confidence of the most exacting of masters; though his
