which they
are charactered, apparent waste of mental forces bent on solving the
insoluble, inherited tastes and prejudices, altruistic impulses
and virile passions, egoism and idealism, all strangely mingled and
continually warring against each other, until from the death-throes of
spiritual conflict issued a new birth and a new life. In the ancient
Scripture "God is love" Tolstoy discerned fresh meaning, and strove with
superhuman energy to bring home that meaning to the world at large. His
doctrine in fact appears less as a new light in the darkness than as a
revival of the pure flame of "the Mystic of the Galilean hills," whose
teaching he accepted while denying His divinity.

Of Tolstoy's beliefs in regard to the Christian religion it may be said
that with advancing years he became more and more disposed to regard
religious truth as one continuous stream of spiritual thought flowing
through the ages of man's history, emanating principally from the
inspired prophets and seers of Israel, India, and China. Finally,
in 1909, in a letter to a friend he summed up his conviction in the
following words:--"For me the doctrine of Jesus is simply one of those
beautiful religious doctrines which we have received from Egyptian,
Jewish, Hindoo, Chinese, and Greek antiquity. The two great principles
of Jesus: love of God--in a word absolute perfection--and love of one's
neighbour, that is to say, love of all men without distinction, have
been preached by all the sages of the world--Krishna, Buddha, Lao-tse,
Confucius, Socrates, Plato, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and among the
moderns, Rousseau, Pascal, Kant, Emerson, Channing, and many others.
Religious and moral truth is everywhere and always the same. I have
no predilection whatever for Christianity. If I have been particularly
interested in the doctrine of Jesus it is, firstly, because I was born
in that religion and have lived among Christians; secondly, because I
have found a great spiritual joy in freeing the doctrine in its purity
from the astounding falsifications wrought by the Churches."

Tolstoy's life-work was indeed a splendid striving to free truth from
falsehood, to simplify the complexities of civilisation and demonstrate
their futility. Realists as gifted have come and gone and left but
little trace. It is conceivable that the great trilogy of "Anna
Karenina," "War and Peace," and "Resurrection" may one day be forgotten,
but Tolstoy's teaching stands on firmer f