There is a vast gulf, ever broadening, between the Russian intelligentia and the _muyiks_. Thought and culture, nay even civilisation, seem to be limited to a select few. The bulk of the people has not only failed to advance from a state in which it was surprised by Jenghiz Khan, but it has actually retrograded to a more savage condition. Revolutions have passed over their heads without in the least affecting them. “The Russian masses,” says Leroy-Beaulieu (_The Empire of the Czars_), “have not felt the breath of either the Renaissance, or the Reformation, or the Revolution. All that has been done in Europe or America for the last four centuries, since the time of Columbus and Luther, Washington and Mirabeau, is, as far as Russia is concerned, non-existent.” The people never think, or at least have not yet left that crude state of barbarism which precedes the dawn of civilisation; the first rays of thought have scarcely tinted with orient hues the dark horizon of ignorance and superstition of the Russian population; the great events have failed to stir its mental inertia. I am, however, far from maintaining that the fault lies with the nature and national character of the people. The rich nature, the subtle spirit of the Slav, his power of adaptation and imitation make him not only accessible to western civilisation and culture but also capable of producing something which bears the impress of the peculiarity of the Slavonic genius. The intelligentia is now giving ample proof corroborating this statement. The Russian intelligentia has passed the phases of growing and changing and doubting and has reached a condition of maturity, asserting its manhood and right. Before examining the intellectual development of the Russian intelligentia and the point it has reached, as compared with western Europe, we must try to find out the causes that first produced that gulf between the few and the many, and the circumstances that were instrumental in widening it.