After these good efforts, Alexander stopped, discouraged. A few
patriotic nobles stood apart from their caste, and strengthened his
hands, as Lafayette and Lincourt strengthened Louis XVI. They even drew
up a plan of voluntary emancipation; formed an association for the
purpose and gained many signatures; but the great weight of that
besotted serf-owning caste was thrown against them, and all came to
naught. Alexander was at last walled in from the great object of his
ambition. Pretended theologians built, between him and emancipation,
walls of Scriptural interpretation; pretended philosophers built walls
of false political economy; pretended statesmen built walls of sham
common-sense. If the Czar could but have mustered courage to cut the
knot! Alas for Russia and for him, he wasted himself in efforts to untie
it. His heart sickened at it; he welcomed death, which alone could
remove him from it.
Alexander's successor, Nicholas I, had been known before his accession
as a mere martinet, a good colonel for parade days, wonderful in
detecting soiled uniforms, terrible in administering petty punishments.
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