to the heathen when it is baptized by the Holy Ghost and comes to appreciate the crisis upon us, and the money flows forth from unlocked treasuries, and love for souls flows forth from sanctified hearts; consecrated laborers and consecrated substance working harmoniously, co-operatively, and without wasteful rivalry, can hasten the millennium. In the presence of the heathen world the Church must present an undivided front or it can never claim the right to trace its origin to pentecost, nor can it convince the heathen mind of the divinity of the religion it proclaims.

The Church has all the appliances needed to fulfill its mission. Resources of history, character, money, machinery, education, science, numbers, the press, the divine promises, are necessary instruments, but they are strengthless, either singly or in combination, until baptized by the Holy Ghost; then, singly, they take on strength, and massed, they become almost omnipotent. These appliances in the possession of the Church, wielded by the Holy Ghost sent by Christ, shall become, like him, sweet in sympathy, pure in holiness, vital with love, all-powerful with victory. Before these, heathen temples would tumble, incense burning to unknown gods would be quenched; air polluted with blasphemy would be purified; ignorance would flee away; the flood-gates of intemperance would be closed; the fires of passion would be quenched, and fountains of bitter tears would be dried up; the crescent and the cross would meet in the holy city: "In the wilderness would waters break out, and streams in the desert. And the ransomed of the Lord would come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, and sorrow and sighing would flee away."

The same power which rested upon the one hundred and twenty disciples on the day of pentecost, constituting then the entire Christian Church, resting upon the present entire membership of the Church, and multiplying converts in a ratio equal to the increase in the first century of the Church's history, would speedily make this world fit for the Saviour's abode, for heathenism would be unknown.

James M. Terny

ART. IV. COUNT LYOF TOLSTOÏ.

COUNT LYOF TOLSTOÏ is a man of undeniable genius and gifts; whose fame has been steadily brightening for the last quarter of a century, and whose name, especially during the last decade, has been on the lips of all reading people, not only in Russia, but in America and England. In short, the whole world has found him out, and ungrudgingly crowned him as a prince in literature.

His popularity at first may probably be ascribed quite as much to his masterful and charming personality as to the excellence of his writings. But to this has been added, of late, the interest aroused by his clear and brilliant exposition of a certain revolution which has taken place in his religious opinions, and his entire character and manner of life as well; an experience which may best be expressed by the term "conversion," and which seems to be as genuine and permanent as it is remarkable.

To one not familiar with the Russian language the data relative to the history and external life of Count Tolstoï are provokingly meager. Although his personality pervades every book he has written, and his religious works, especially, are rare specimens of mental and spiritual autobiography, his every-day life, and the details of his plans and projects, are kept persistently in the background; while his retirement in the country, and the suspicion with which his opinions are regarded by the Russian government, draw a veil of privacy about his movements that cannot easily be lifted. A mere sketch of his career is, therefore, all that can with any degree of confidence be offered here by way of introduction to what may be said about his books.

Count Lyof Nikolayevitch Tolstoï was born on his father's estate in the Russian province of Tula, in the year 1829. Ilis father was a retired lieutenant-colonel, who proudly traced his pedigree back to a Count Tolstoï who was the friend and companion of Peter the Great. His mother was the only daughter of Prince Nikolaï Sergeyevitch Volkonsky. She died when he was but two years old, and a distant relative took charge of the training of the four brothers and one sister. In 1843 Lyof en24-FIFTH Series, vol. V.

tered the University of Kazan, taking up particularly the study of Oriental languages. One year after he exchanged that course for the law, which occupied his attention for two years more. At the end of that time he suddenly determined to leave the university, without taking his degree, and returned to his old home at Yasnaïa Polyana, where, with his brothers, he lived in the enjoyment of a charming country life until 1851. That year he followed his favorite brother, Nikolaï, into the army, and to the Caucasus, where he shortly began to write his first novels, The Cossacks and Childhood and Youth. He lived amid the splendid scenery and enjoyed the free life of the Caucasus for nearly three years. When the Eastern war broke out, in 1853, he was transferred. at his own request, to the army of the Danube, and served on the staff of the renowned Prince Gortchakoff. Subsequently, he took part in the famous defense of Sebastopol, afterward recording his thrilling experiences in the sketches entitled, Sebastopol in December, in May, and in August. At the close of the war he retired to private life, and devoted himself to literary work, spending the winter months in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and his summers on his estate, until 1861. These were years of great literary activity, and, in his own country at least, he gained recognition as a writer of the first rank. The emancipation of the serfs in 1861-an event in which he was deeply interested-turned his closest attention toward agronomic questions, which he studied with enthusiasm, not only at home but in other European countries. In 1862 he married, became a magistrate, and decided to live continuously on his estate, and devote himself mainly to the education of the peasantry and a general improvement of their condition.

In 1875-77 his literary genius reached its culmination in the production of his greatest work of fiction, Anna Karenina. Since that time he has not ceased to disappoint the expectations of his purely literary admirers, having abandoned fiction as an unworthy field of effort, adopted an unexplained sort of communism, excluded himself from general society, taken up the simple life of the common people, among whom he seeks his associates, and occupying his leisure hours mainly in the composition of religious works, in which he elaborates certain eccentric and more or less impracticable theories.

Though living upon and managing his large estate, he holds to the simplest habits, and lives in the plainest practicable manner. He indulges no fanciful ideas in farming; indeed, the general appearance of his substantial but unpretending mansion and grounds more than intimates that but little attention is given to the æsthetic side of life. In the cultivation of his estate he seems to be studying the interests of the peasantry rather than his own. All improvements tend in that direction, while his own tastes, as an educated and refined nobleman, are evidently forgotten or ignored.

With the exception of his family, only a few of the members of which are in full sympathy with his plans, and occasional visitors, his associations are entirely with the rude peasantry, with whom he lives upon terms of perfect equality, discarding all titles and formalities, abrogating all authority, and seeking to influence them solely for their own good by sympathy and love; a very difficult task, judging from reported results, and yet in the prosecution of which his ardor does not seem to cool as the years go by. He gives a portion of each day and evening to manual labor, spending the morning in plowing, sowing, scattering manure, or haying, as the case may be— usually in aid of some very poor or disabled tenant-and an hour or two of each evening in shoemaking, at which he is quite an adept.

His simple habits promote good health and clear-headedness, and as a result the hours he devotes to literary work are very productive, in his chosen field of study, both in quality and quantity. His hospitality to the poor as well as the rich is unbounded, and evidently unaffected, and the practical application of his unselfish religious principles to the life of every day insures him a cheerful soul, and makes him, indeed, a father and a friend to all about him. To repeat his own testimony, whereas he was once dissatisfied and embittered by the emptiness of life, he now has peace, hope, and health, "with happy yesterdays and confident to-morrows."

Count Tolstoï has achieved his most permanent fame in fiction, several of his novels easily taking rank among the great artistic productions of the century. He is justly called the founder of the realist school in fiction, the aim of which "is to hold up the mirror to human nature, and to depict it with sub

tile observation alike in its outward features and its most hidden motives. It is an attempt to set forth life as it is, in all its natural surroundings, with exactitude and simplicity." He must, however, be held in no way responsible for the sins of many of his disciples, especially among the French writers. Zola and his Parisian compeers in "impressionist" literature can find no warrant for their degrading impurity in the writings of the Russian Count. To be sure, he frequently wearies us with the minuteness of his details and his "cruel realities" of life, but he never descends to vileness; never compels his art to grind in the mill of lasciviousness. Details are among the materials in his superb structure, not the structure itself; the means conscientiously employed, not the end and aim of his effort. He simply photographs real life, and then, with the unerring skill of genius, so arranges his facts that they naturally and forcibly teach the desired lesson.

Tolstoï is, beyond question, the greatest creative genius in fiction which Russia has yet produced, except possibly Turgenef; and with equal certainty we may say that the novel entitled Anna Karenina is his best work, and therefore may be taken as a worthy illustration of his character and methods as an author. This book is the most "relentless analysis of the human emotions, and of the action and reaction of social relations," that has appeared in modern times. To speak of it justly in this particular is to incur the suspicion of extravagance; for in mental and moral insight, and in the masterly array of events and influences for the final impression, Tolstoï is not second to George Eliot, or even Nathaniel Hawthorne. His pure moral purpose is so apparent, and lies so near his heart, that notwithstanding some details which would otherwise offend our sense of propriety the effect of the whole is elevating and refining. On every page we find evidences of a good heart prompting a clear mind, and we are grateful for the warmth as well as light which he brings to us. The story was slowly written, and first published as a serial in the Russian Messenger, and though it continued, not for months alone, but for years, it still kept public attention to the end. Its power is simply immense. After reading it "real life seems like fiction, and fiction like real life. There is not a detail added that does not increase the effect of this realism."