IN 1812 AND 1813 Kutuzov was openly accused of blunders. The Tsar was dissatisfied with him. And in a recent history inspired by promptings from the highest quarters, Kutuzov is spoken of as a designing, intriguing schemer, who was panic-stricken at the name of Napoleon, and guilty through his blunders at Krasnoe and Berezina of robbing the Russian army of the glory of complete victory over the French. Such is the lot of men not recognised by Russian intelligence as “great men,” grands hommes; such is the destiny of those rare and always solitary men who divining the will of Providence submit their personal will to it. The hatred and contempt of the crowd is the punishment of such men for their comprehension of higher laws.

Strange and terrible to say, Napoleon, the most insignificant tool of history, who never even in exile displayed one trait of human dignity, is the subject of the admiration and enthusiasm of the Russian historians; in their eyes he is a grand homme.

Kutuzov, the man who from the beginning to the end of his command in 1812, from Borodino to Vilna, was never in one word or deed false to himself, presents an example exceptional in history of self-sacrifice and recognition in the present of the relative value of events in the future. Kutuzov is conceived of by the historians as a nondescript, pitiful sort of creature, and whenever they speak of him in the year 1812, they seem a little ashamed of him.

And yet it is difficult to conceive of an historical character whose energy could be more invariably directed to the same unchanging aim. It is difficult to imagine an aim more noble and more in harmony with the will of a whole people. Still more difficult would it be to find an example in history where the aim of any historical personage has been so completely attained as the aim towards which all Kutuzov's efforts were devoted in 1812.

Kutuzov never talked of “forty centuries looking down from the Pyramids,” of the sacrifices he was making for the fatherland, of what he meant to do or had done. He did not as a rule talk about himself, played no sort of part, always seemed the plainest and most ordinary man, and said the plainest and most ordinary things. He wrote letters to his daughters and to Madame de Sta?l, read novels, liked the company of pretty women, made jokes with the generals, the officers, and the soldiers, and never contradicted the people, who tried to prove anything to him. When Count Rastoptchin galloped up to him at Yautsky bridge, and reproached him personally with being responsible for the loss of Moscow, and said: “Didn't you promise not to abandon Moscow without a battle?” Kutuzov answered: “And I am not abandoning Moscow without a battle,” although Moscow was in fact already abandoned. When Araktcheev came to him from the Tsar to say that Yermolov was to be appointed to the command of the artillery, Kutuzov said: “Yes, I was just saying so myself,” though he had said just the opposite a moment before. What had he, the one man who grasped at the time all the vast issues of events, to do in the midst of that dull-witted crowd? What did he care whether Count Rastoptchin put down the disasters of the capital to him or to himself? Still less could he be concerned by the question which man was appointed to the command of the artillery.

This old man, who through experience of life had reached the conviction that the thoughts and words that serve as its expression are never the motive force of men, frequently uttered words, which were quite meaningless—the first words that occurred to his mind.

But heedless as he was of his words, he never once throughout all his career uttered a single word which was inconsistent with the sole aim for the attainment of which he was working all through the war. With obvious unwillingness, with bitter conviction that he would not be understood, he more than once, under the most different circumstances, gave expression to his real thought. His first differed from all about him after the battle of Borodino, which he alone persisted in calling a victory, and this view he continued to assert verbally and in reports and to his dying day. He alone said that the loss of Moscow is not the loss of Russia. In answer to the overtures for peace, his reply to Lauriston was: There can be no peace, for such is the people's will. He alone during the retreat of the French said that all our man?uvres are unnecessary; that everything is being done of itself better than we could desire; that we must give the enemy a “golden bridge”; that the battles of Tarutino, of Vyazma, and of Krasnoe, were none of them necessary; that we must keep some men to reach the frontier with; that he wouldn't give one Russian for ten Frenchmen. And he, this intriguing courtier, as we are told, who lied to Araktcheev to propitiate the Tsar, he alone dared to face the Tsar's displeasure by telling him at Vilna that to carry the war beyond the frontier would be mischievous and useless.

But words alone would be no proof that he grasped the significance of events at the time. His actions—all without the slightest deviation— were directed toward the one threefold aim: first, to concentrate all his forces to strike a blow at the French; secondly, to defeat them; and thirdly, to drive them out of Russia, alleviating as far as was possible the sufferings of the people and the soldiers in doing so.

He, the lingerer Kutuzov, whose motto was always “Time and Patience,” the sworn opponent of precipitate action, he fought the battle of Borodino, and made all his preparations for it with unwonted solemnity. Before the battle of Austerlitz he foretold that it would be lost, but at Borodino, in spite of the conviction of the generals that the battle was a defeat, in spite of the fact, unprecedented in history, of his army being forced to retreat after the victory, he alone declared in opposition to all that it was a victory, and persisted in that opinion to his dying day. He was alone during the whole latter part of the campaign in insisting that there was no need of fighting now, that it was a mistake to cross the Russian frontier and to begin a new war. It is easy enough now that all the events with their consequences lie before us to grasp their significance, if only we refrain from attributing to the multitude the aims that only existed in the brains of some dozen or so of men.

But how came that old man, alone in opposition to the opinion of all, to gauge so truly the importance of events from the national standard, so that he never once was false to the best interests of his country?

The source of this extraordinary intuition into the significance of contemporary events lay in the purity and fervour of patriotic feeling in his heart.

It was their recognition of this feeling in him that led the people in such a strange manner to pick him out, an old man out of favour, as the chosen leader of the national war, against the will of the Tsar. And this feeling alone it was to which he owed his exalted position, and there he exerted all his powers as commander-in-chief not to kill and maim men, but to save them and have mercy on them.

This simple, modest, and therefore truly great figure, could not be cast into the false mould of the European hero, the supposed leader of men, that history has invented.

To the flunkey no man can be great, because the flunkey has his own flunkey conception of greatness.

在一八一二年和一八一三年，竟公开指责库图佐夫，说他犯了错误。皇帝对他不满意。不久前，遵照最高当局旨意编写的历史，就说库图佐夫是一个老奸巨滑的宫廷骗子，连拿破仑这个名字都害怕，由于他在克拉斯诺耶和别列济纳的错误，使俄国军队失去了获得彻底胜利的荣誉①。

俄国的知识界不承认不伟大的人——Hegrand－hom

me②就命该如此，而这种命运是少见的，常常是孤独的人的命运，这种人领悟了上帝的旨意，使个人的意志服从上帝的意志。群众因为对最高法则恍然大悟，用憎恨和蔑视惩罚那些人。

①见波格丹诺维奇著：《论库图佐夫及令人不满的克拉斯诺耶战役》——托尔斯泰注。

②法语：伟大人物。

在俄国历史学家看来（说来多么令人奇怪和可怕！），拿破仑——这个历史上的微不足道的傀儡——，这个无论在何时、何地、甚至在流放期间也没有表现出人类尊严的东西，却成了值得赞扬和令人欢喜的对象，他grand（伟大）。而库图佐夫在一八一二年战争期间，他的活动从一开始到最后，从波罗底诺到维尔纳，他的一言一行从未违反初衷，他是一个历史上最不平凡的具有自我牺牲、能事先洞察出将要发生的事件的意义的典范。而库图佐夫在某些人的心目中，是一个难以捉摸的可怜虫，一谈到库图佐夫和一八一二年，他们总觉得好像有点耻辱似的。

然而，很难想象这样的历史人物，他的活动，为了达到既定目标，始终如一。难以设想会有比这更可贵，更符合全体人民意愿的目标。在历史上便难以找出另外的例子，像库图佐夫在一八一二年，为了达到历史所付与的那个目标，竭尽全力，终于达到那个目标。

库图佐夫从来不说他“站在金字塔上瞻望四十世纪”①，不谈他为祖国作出的牺牲，不谈他想要做和已经做了的事，总之，他根本不谈自己，不装腔作势，永远显出是最普通、最平凡的人，说最普通、最平凡的话。他给女儿和斯塔埃尔夫人写信，读小说，喜欢和漂亮的女人交际，和将军们、军官们、士兵们开玩笑，从来不驳斥那些力图向他证明某件事情的人。拉斯托普钦伯爵在雅乌兹桥上向库图佐夫提到关于莫斯科陷落的错误时说：“您不是保证过不经战斗决不放弃的吗？”库图佐夫回答道：“不经过战斗，我是不会放弃莫斯科的，”虽然那时莫斯科已经放弃了。阿拉克契耶夫从皇帝身边来，他对库图佐夫说，应当任命叶尔莫洛夫为炮兵司令，库图佐夫回答说：“是的，我刚才就这样说过了。”虽然他在一分钟之前所讲的完全是另外一回事。库图佐夫周围全是些糊涂虫，只有他一个人才理解当时事件的全部巨大意义，拉斯托普钦伯爵把首都的灾难归咎于他本人或者是归咎于他，这对他有什么关系呢？至于任命谁来担任炮兵司令，对他就更无所谓了。

①此处指拿破仑站在埃及金字塔上对军队说过的话。

这个老人的生活经验使他坚信，思想和表达思想的语言并不是人的动力的本质的东西，所以不仅在这些场合下他这么说，他总是一想到什么就脱口而出，说了一些完全没有意义的话。

但是，正是这个说话随随便便的人，在他的全部活动中，没有说过一句与他在整个战争期间所要达到的那个唯一的目的不相符合的话。显然，他怀着不为人们理解的沉重心情，在各种各样的场合中不由自主的再三再四地表明了他的思想。自从波罗底诺战役一开始，他就与周围的人有了分歧，他一个人说，·波·罗·底·诺·战·役·是·胜·利，一直到临终前，他在口头上，在所有报告中，在所有战斗总结中都是这样说的。只有他一个人说，失掉莫斯科不是失掉俄罗斯。他在答复洛里斯顿建议和谈时说，不能和谈，因为这是人民的意志；在法国人退却时，又是只有他一个人说，我军的一切调动都没有必要，一切都听其自然，这样会比我们所期望的完成的会更好，对敌人要给以生络，塔鲁丁诺、维亚济马、克拉斯诺耶等战役，都没有必要，在抵达国境线时应当还有一点实力，用十个法国人换一个俄国人，他都不干。

而他——这位宫廷内的大人物——是一个被人们描绘成为了讨取皇帝的欢心而向阿拉克契耶夫撤谎的人。只有他——这位宫廷大人物在维尔纳失去了皇帝的宠爱——只他一个人说，把以后的战争打到国境线以外去是有害的，是没有益处的。

但是仅仅用语言还不能够证明他在当时就理解了事件的意义。他的行动全部朝着一个既定的目标，从来不曾有过一丝一毫的违背，这个目标为以下的三个方面：第一，竭尽全力和法国人作战，第二，要打败他们，第三，把他们从俄罗斯赶出去，尽最大可能减轻人员和军队的痛苦。

库图佐夫老成持重，他的座右铭是“忍耐和时间”，他与那些主张死拼硬打的人是水火不相容的，就是他以前所未有的严肃态度，在做好一切准备之后，发动了波罗底诺战役。就是这个库图佐夫在奥斯特利茨战役尚未打响之前，他就断言那次战役肯定要打输，而在波罗底诺尽管将军们都认为那次战役是打输了，尽管在历史上还未曾听说有过这种先例：打胜了的军队还要撤退，只有他一个人力排众议，一直到他临终都坚持说，波罗底诺战役是胜利。只有他一个人，在整个退却期间都坚决主张不进行当时已经成为无益的战斗，不再发动新的战争，俄军不要跨越过边界线。

如果不把十多个人头脑中的目的偏偏说成是群众行动的目的，现在来理解事件的意义就很容易了，因为，全部事件及其后果都已经摆在我们的面前。

但是，这位老人怎么能在当时力排众议，准确地看出人民对事件的看法的重要意义，在他的全部活动过程中没有一次改变过这种看法呢？

对当时所发生的事件的意义之所以能看得如此之透彻，其根源就在于他拥有十分纯洁和强烈的人民感情。

正是由于人民承认他具有这种感情，人民才以那样奇特的方式，违反了沙皇的心愿，选定他——这个不得宠的老头子——作为人民战争的代表。正是这种感情把他抬到人间最高的地位，他这位身居高位的总司令，他不是用他的全副精力去屠杀和迫害人们，而是去拯救和怜悯他们。

这个朴实、谦虚，因而才是真正伟大的形象，这不能归入历史所虚构出来的所谓统治人民的伪造的欧洲英雄的模式。

对于奴才来说，不可能有伟大的人物，因为奴才有奴才对伟大这个概念的理解。