Having looked upon Russia in a moment of her repose, let us now consider one of her deeds, accomplished before our very eyes
Having looked upon Russia in a moment of her repose, let us now consider one of her deeds, accomplished before our very eyes. All Europe, having made ready for several years and gathered its forces, in the persons of twenty tongues, burst through undefended frontiers into the very heart of her, under the leadership of the greatest commander of the ancient and modern world, who in this campaign staked his glory, saw the end of long years of labour and the fulfilment of his most cherished desires, and what of it? Within a few months, at the Tsar's word, not a single foreigner was left on Russian soil, and the dread enemy, the conqueror of kingdoms and peoples, the judge of the whole world, drags out his dismal days upon a desert island and, in hours of inspired revelation, gazing into the future, foretells to Europe the dominion of Russia.
Having repulsed such an attack in triumph, having delivered Europe from such an enemy, having cast him down from such a height, possessed of such resources, needing no one and needed by all, what can Russia have to fear? Who will dare to dispute her primacy, who will prevent her from deciding the fate of Europe and the fate of all mankind, should she but wish it? -
Portugal, perhaps, torn in her corner by civil war between two brothers, or Spain, over which the spirit of Philip II still hangs like a heavy gloom, - or England, a State of the rich and the beggared, sinking under the burden of her unpayable debt and scarcely able to feed her own population, - or France, whom, after such bloody experiments, after the Revolution and Napoleon, all her great talents cannot pacify, her Guizots and Dupins, her Bignons and Periers, with all their excellent theories and famous discoveries in the sciences, - or the Austrian Empire, which, for all the efforts of her Kaunitzes and Metternichs, can barely hold together her motley dominions, - or Sweden and Denmark, which cannot in any way pass beyond the bounds assigned them by Nature, or the German states, our fiftieth Governorates? - I repeat, who will prevent the Russian Tsar from deciding the fate of Europe, the fate of all mankind, under known conditions? Who will undertake to refute this mathematical conclusion? Such is the future that opens at a single glance at Russia in a single moment of her existence!
Mikhail Petrovich Pogodin, A Glance at Russian History. Lecture at the opening of the course, September 1832.
