I shall return to the rationalist doctrine of personality when I speak of Chicherin, but a few words must also be said about Mikhailovsky's rationalism. Mikhailovsky, like any rationalist, defended the impersonal, colorless, abstract, general personality all his life, defended a biological abstraction devoid of individuality, and this was the irony of fate over the "fighter for individuality." Like every rationalist, he did not take human nature in its mystical, supra-rational integrity and fullness, he took it abstractly, rationalistically dissected it, and thus killed the living, immediate life that touches us with the mystery of the world. The fullness of the experiences of the human personality is inaccessible to the rationalist, and only this fullness brings us into contact with "other worlds," and only here do we find our individuality, essentially irrational, unique in its originality.

Rationalism is too afraid of everything dark, mysterious, problematic in a human being, everything that can prevent him from settling down successfully, lining up human personalities in rows, and rationing everything and everything. For us, the human personality is not a biological or ethical-epistemological abstraction, but a living, concrete individual spirit, in its superrational fullness in contact with the inner being of the world. Rationalism always deals with a secondary, rationalized, abstractly dissected consciousness, and for it the path to primary, living consciousness, experiencing the fullness of being, is closed. That is why rationalism, which appears under the guise of empiricism, recognizes only conditional, rational experience enclosed in a spatio-temporal prison, an experience enclosed by the high walls of the categories of reason. And he is afraid to look directly into the eyes of transcendental, mystical experience, tearing apart all boundaries and destroying all walls. In our national spirit there are the makings of a philosophy of super-rationalism, super-rationality, and this is reflected in our rebelliousness, which does not fit into any framework, in our longing and longing for new, "other worlds"2. The foundations of true individualism are contained in the philosophy and religion of Christianity. Only Christianity placed love and freedom above any law and gave absolute meaning and significance to the fate of the individual person. And we would like to find it again, cleansed of historical distortions. And it seems to me that we have great philosophical rights to declare a "struggle for individuality"3', since we do not humiliate the individual by abstract rational leveling. Mikhailovsky will be forgiven for his rationalism for democracy, for his stubborn and tireless thought about the people. But Chicherin was not forgiven anything.

Justice demands that Chicherin be recognized as one of the strongest Russian minds. His knowledge and the scope of his interests were unusually extensive. But no one liked him, there was something unpleasant in his Writer's individuality, something binding, not liberating. It was an administrative mind, it gave orders and did not tolerate disobedience, there was something too doctric in this mind, and something too rational in nature. Chicherin loved order terribly, and everything found a place in his system, everything turned out to be justified and enrolled in a certain category. Read his Science and Religion (this is Chicherin's main philosophical work, representing a whole philosophical system), and you will be unpleasantly struck by the fact that the religious problem is treated in such a rational way, that God turns out to be the god of order and order, that the most decisive idealism does not lead to new worlds, that in the old, old world everything remains in the same place. His religion is a preservative, not a liberating force. And it preserves the old economic, family, state and other foundations of life. The birth of new forms of life is out of the question. Chicherin is a very versatile and strong mind, but he always lacked creativity, and he defended that form of Hegelianism which considers the truth to be discovered once and for all. And it was somehow dreary and stifling to live in this rationalistic prison of canticized Hegelianism, and then all searches ceased. Rationalist logic took everything into its own hands and created an iron discipline; irrational moods, for which all kinds of abysses open, are not allowed. And it was a slander against the living God.

Modern idealists were told that they had to put Chicherin in their genealogy. And to a certain extent, of course, this is true. We did not invent metaphysical idealism, and thanks to Chicherin that he defended it in the most difficult epoch for this trend. But there is also a big difference. Chicherin never strove for new moods, for the creation of a new, transformed man. He created only a system of rational ideas for the establishment of a strong order of life, unshakable knowledge, morality, the state, the family, etc. This man never understood tragedy, did not allow it, and therefore he is a stranger to us. Chicherin was essentially a conservative and was always a stranger to the alcoholisms that are dearest to us.

Chicherin's strongest point is his philosophy of law, here we must give a high assessment of his work. Chicherin was a brilliant defender of the theory of natural law, and the latest idealist trends in the philosophy of law should honor him as their most important predecessor. Positivism triumphed, and every talk of natural law evoked only a condescending smile, and Chicherin courageously defended this old and eternal idea, to which human thought has returned again, and which lies at the foundation of all social philosophy. Mikhailovsky was not in a position to defend the rights of the individual philosophically; in the end, in contradiction to his individualism, he had to deduce them from society, from the whole, outside the individual, which was present and valued his rights. This is the lot of all positivism; A person does not have absolute significance and rights inherent in his nature, he receives everything from the outside, everything in him is evaluated according to the interests of a collective unit external to him. A fighter for individuality, Mikhailovsky could not liberate the individual from slavery to external nature and society, he did not see that inner metaphysical essence of the personality, which alone can be recognized as unconditionally and infinitely valuable and opposed to any external violence.

Chicherin occupies a much more fortified position. For him, the human personality was a metaphysical being, not deducible from the natural and social environment. The rights of the individual are rooted not in the dictates of society and not in the accidental gifts of historical development, but in the metaphysical timeless nature of man, they are its direct expression. The demands of law are the voice of reason, absolute, universal Reason. Man is a morally rational, free being, and his metaphysical freedom is the source of his rights, which must be recognized and crystallized in society. Chicherin's definition of law as freedom is the only true and most profound definition. And the point is only to draw all the consistent conclusions from this. Chicherin understood the metaphysical nature of law and the deep inner connection between political freedom and metaphysical freedom. Idealistic legal consciousness was deeply embedded in him, and respect for the individual, for his rights and freedom, constituted the pathos of his life, his religion. Chicherin was our only theoretician of liberalism, and only he understood the deepest ideal foundations of liberalism. Where the dignity of the individual has not yet been recognized, where freedom is subjected to desecration, and subjective rights have not yet crystallized in objective law, such a thinker and publicist should be especially revered, his merits should be recognized by all. Why is Chicherin so little known, why did he never control the hearts, did not control the thoughts of our intelligentsia, which yearns with its whole being for freedom and law?

Chicherin was an implacable enemy of democracy all his life. His brilliant and profound works are filled with the most vicious outbursts against the social movement, with the crudest incomprehension of it. It is unpleasant to read those passages in the Philosophy of Law which deal with socialism, it is difficult to see how bourgeois narrow-mindedness distorts the thought of such an outstanding thinker. This great logical and ethical sin could not and should not have forgiven Chicherin. Historical conditions developed in such a way that bourgeois liberalism could not succeed in our country. Our emancipatory aspirations were painted not only in a democratic color, but also had a more or less social character. And it is impossible to find access to wide circles of the Russian intelligentsia if we repeat the historical betrayal of the principles of liberalism, which was committed in Europe by liberal social forces. For a long time we have absorbed a feeling of hatred and contempt for bourgeois society, and this fundamentally just instinct has often led us to distort the historical perspective in politics. We did not know how to be real politicians and therefore were unable to appreciate the great political significance of Chicherin's journalistic activity. Only now is the immediate force of life pushing us onto a more realistic path and forcing us to recognize the complexity and variety of methods of struggle, the inevitability of various kinds of temporary agreements and temporary cooperation of different social forces. And now more than ever it is necessary to smash the prejudices of the two opposite sides: the one that considers the very nature of liberalism to be bourgeois, and the one that draws bourgeois conclusions from the principles of liberalism for the sake of its own class self-interest.

The word liberalism is tarnished and devalued, although it comes from the greatest of human words, the word freedom. If we take the principles of liberalism in their ideal purity, in their supra-historical, timeless meaning, then they are a direct expression of the metaphysical nature of the human personality, a political formulation of unconditional respect for the freedom of the spiritual being. The essence of liberalism is in the natural, inalienable, absolute in their own way

8 This was written back in the era of the existence of the "Union of Liberation", which collapsed after October 17.

the source of the rights of the individual, in freedom and equality; The realization of liberalism is the replacement of violent relations between people by free relations, and it rests on the ultimate ideal, the union of people based on inner freedom. True liberalism sees the source of individual rights not in state power, whatever it may be, even if it is an expression of the sovereign will of the people, but in absolute values, independent of the will of individuals, a part of the people, or the whole people. Therefore, the "declaration of the rights of man and of the citizen" is not a declaration of the will of the people, the accidental will of people, but is a revelation of the absolute values contained in the metaphysical essence of the free spirit. The freedom and rights of the individual are above all power, even if it be the power of the people, above all desires and interests, even the working class. The right of private property was proclaimed by the accidental and relative will of people (a certain social group), but the right of freedom of conscience or freedom of speech was the revelation of an absolute, super-historical good. And the whole task is to educate the will of people, the will of creative social groups in respect and love for the absolute values expressed in the "Declaration of Rights". And woe to those who are tempted by temporal goods and prefer them to eternal freedom, who subordinate the valuable to the useful and do not understand that there are inalienable rights. Pure, true liberalism, untainted by the touch of social forces that have betrayed freedom in the name of their interests, asserts the absolute significance of the human person and does not in principle make his rights dependent on accidental historical forces, therefore it expresses the tasks of people's social life, sets goals, and has an undying value. The idea of the natural rights of the individual and their guarantees in the social system, the idea of freedom and equality, cannot become obsolete, the understanding of the meaning of social development as a process of liberation, the roots of which lie in the metaphysical depth of human nature, will not become obsolete. Chicherin understood this depth of liberalism and perfectly connected it with idealist metaphysics. He stands head and shoulders above the ordinary liberal positivists, who defend liberalism without understanding its essence and significance. In this way, Chicherin correctly established the initial foundation in the construction of social philosophy. He is a first-class philosopher and jurist. But then Chicherin made a fatal mistake.

What is the attitude of liberalism to democracy? Democracy is only one of the definitions of liberalism, its explanation, its inevitable conclusion from the principles of liberalism. Non-democratic liberalism is essentially a contradictio in adjecto, and the anti-democratic liberal currents that already manifested themselves in the era of the Great French Revolution were a logical and ethical distortion of the ideas of liberalism for the sake of class interests, a manifestation of historical and class limitations. Once the absolute significance and inalienable rights of every human person are recognized, then democracy with all its conclusions is ideologically affirmed and class distinctions are denied. The "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen" is the proclamation of the kingdom of democracy; it requires respect not only for the rights of the individual (of every person regardless of his external position), but also for every individual will through which the creation of new forms of life must pass. Consistent and sincere individualism is always democratic, since for it there is only the individual personality as such, its spiritual nature and its inner uniqueness, and not the social determinations of the personality, which turn it into a part of the whole, obscure its appearance. To defend social and political inequality is to encroach on the sanctum sanctorum of individualism, to place things above man, to exalt one human individuality for its things (social advantages) and to belittle another for the absence of these things. In an evaluation based on social and political inequality, individuality as such disappears, becomes obscured, the spiritually insignificant triumphs over the spiritually significant, because dress determines the attitude towards a person. This kingdom of philistine values, by which the bourgeois world lives, has ruined human individuality. Real spiritual aristocracy is possible only in a democracy, only after the masters of the historical stage cease to be strong by their social position, and not by their spiritual power. It is precisely because we are individualists, because we recognize the profound spiritual differences of individuals, because we recognize the value of the human person as such, in his inner nature, that we demand the most resolute democracy and long for the cessation of the power of things over men. Let life create the personality and put its individual stamp on it, and not the things that belong to the individual, not the impersonal things whose power was so brilliantly grasped by Marx. And perhaps socialism is the only reagent by which the difference of spiritual individualities can be manifested and each of them can be defined in its real uniqueness. And in any case, it needs to be justified before the court of individualism as its historically relative means. This justification is given by modern history...

Mikhailovsky understood the connection between individualism and democracy, and this was his strong point. Chicherin did not understand this and could not understand it, his bright mind was distorted by class traditions and prejudices, he was chained to the fictitious values of bourgeois society. All his life Chicherin was afraid even of a purely political liberal democracy, and in order to hide himself from its victorious demands, he made the most pitiful compromises with his philosophy of law, substituting for natural law, always radical in spirit, for historical law, under the shadow of which the ruling classes of modern society could calmly feel themselves. The attitude to democracy that Chicherin derived from his idealistic liberalism was also a purely logical fall. Liberalism and democracy are one and the same, and if we nevertheless subordinate the latter to the former, it is because we fundamentally place freedom above the people, law above power. But the people must be free, and the free establishment of a new social order must pass through the individual will of the whole people.

Chicherin's attitude to the social movement is already completely shameful for the thinker. This cold, reasonable mind began to swear and showed the most monstrous incomprehension. Chicherin was a very poor economist and was already quite Quixotic in defending Manchesterism when it was abandoned by everyone. This did not do credit to Chicherin's economic sagacity and economic education, but, perhaps, did credit to the steadfastness of his character. He never yielded an inch of economic individualism and was the most stubborn Old Believer, he was ready to defend some Bastiat when everyone had long forgotten about him. Chicherin intertwined the high traits of his individual character, which inspired respect for everyone, with a very unpleasant persistence in prejudice, partiality and unwillingness to move forward, to search. He never doubted anything, this stony, rational man. It is Chicherin's merit that he was one of the first to revolt against the Narodnik idealization of the commune and to give it a more correct interpretation. In this he can even be recognized as the predecessor of Russian Marxism. There is nothing to refute Chicherin's socio-economic delusions, it is too elementary. I will point out only one very important aspect of this issue.

Chicherin's socio-philosophical fall, like the historical fall of the bourgeoisie, was the proclamation of the historical right of private property as a natural right. This was not only logically defective, not only was it a manifestation of the bourgeois class narrow-mindedness and historical relativity of the bourgeois epoch, but it was also an encroachment on the individual dignity of the human person, since it associated the value of man with impersonal things that were not created by him. Economic individualism was historically an accidental predicate of liberalism and did not enter into its true essence. The liberal "declaration of rights" is consistently applied and developed by the modern social movement. For example, the German Social-Democracy is the only liberal party that really fights against reaction in the name of freedom, and the German "liberals" are the least likely to claim this title, since they have betrayed freedom in the name of their social welfare. Social democracy is only a method of consistent development and implementation of the principles of liberalism. We must not forget this. If democracy is an inseparable deduction from the essence of liberalism, then democracy also inevitably becomes social. And the creative task is to eliminate the discrepancy between the social content and the forms of the "declaration of rights", which ideologically condemned the class structure of society. We must boldly and fearlessly make the most consistent consequences from the liberal-democratic "declaration of the rights of man and of the citizen," that is, we must recognize the struggle for liberation from social enslavement as a struggle consistently liberal and justified by the metaphysical presuppositions of our liberalism.