Chapter 12, Part 4 of The Kingdom of God is Within You: The Perils and Reality of Liberal Hypocrisy

Chapter 12, Part Four:

Tolstoy opens the section by arguing for his conception of progress being the revelation of truth and love through individual people changing public opinion by arguing against the idea that moral and religious history is purely a matter of circumstances.

according to this doctrine, all the founders of religions, such as Moses and the prophets, Confucius, Lao-tse, Buddha, Christ, and others preached their teachings, and their followers accepted them, not because they loved truth, elucidated it to themselves, and professed it, but because the political, social, and, above all, economic conditions of the nations among whom these teachings appeared and were disseminated were favourable for their manifestation and diffusion.

This part of the book is formatted somewhat strangely, with the opening arguing against social and political realities being the key factor of moral progress and then, as we shall see below, the key opponent of the part is liberal hypocrisy. Before we get there, we have to hear Tolstoy's argument out and ferret out the differences between his own philosophy and those of liberals who argue that change comes from political conditions.

And so the chief activity of a man wishing to serve society and ameliorate the condition of humanity must according to this doctrine be directed, not to the elucidation of the truth and its profession, but to the amelioration of the external political, social, and, above all else, economic conditions. Now the change of these political, social, and economic conditions is accomplished partly by means of serving the government and of introducing into it liberal and progressive principles, partly by contributing to the development of industry and the dissemination of socialistic ideas, and chiefly by the diffusion of scientific education.

There are several differentiations and connections that Tolstoy makes here that need to be unpacked. First, we see that Tolstoy believes the most important element of human progress is moral progress and an understanding of the truth of our existence. He sets this apart from economic progress, which is the primary goal of political organizations (for conservatives and liberals it is economic growth and for socialists it is the redistribution of resources) so we must notice that the goal of Tolstoy's revolution is much different than other revolutionists and his anarchism is not about resetting or reorganizing power because he sees this whole process as missing the point of human existence and moral progress. This is important to his connection with liberals who may work for progress and hypocritical servers of the state, as we see in the second sentence above. For liberals, progress comes through state power and serving the state to make it better. While these are obviously fine goals, for Tolstoy, this leads to hypocrisy and a further entrenchment of enslavement by the state.

According to this theory is it possible, though remaining a landed proprietor, a merchant, a manufacturer, a judge, an official, receiving a salary from the government, a soldier, an officer, to be, withal, not only a humane man, but even a socialist and revolutionist. Hypocrisy, which formerly used to have a religious foundation in the doctrine about the fall of the human race, about redemption, and about the church, in this teaching received in our time a new scientific foundation, and so has caught in its net all those men who from the degree of their development can no longer fall back on the religious hypocrisy.

As we saw in the previous part, the separation of the public and private life has lead to the excusing of all kinds of crimes and violence. Liberal thought, which holds that society can only be improved through the attempt to make current systems better, leads to a contradiction and hypocritical life. This emboldens the institutions and makes them stronger by necessitating their existence, strengthening them by giving them a scientific or philosophic basis. Tolstoy compares this to religious hypocrisy, in which the church claims eternal support from God and is taken as an unquestioned necessity. Liberals that participate in the state do not question the possibility of it not existing, but instead feed into it while claiming to be attempting to better it.

so this man, without the least compunction, and without any misgivings as to his being believed, arranges an agricultural exhibition, or a temperance society, or through his wife and children sends jackets and soup to three old women, and in his family, in drawing-rooms, committees, the press, boldly preaches the Gospel or humane love of one's neighbour in general, and of that working agricultural class in particular which he constantly torments and oppresses. And the men who are in the same condition with him believe him, praise him, and with him solemnly discuss the questions as to what measures should be used for the amelioration of the condition of the working masses, on the spoliation of whom their life is based, inventing for the purpose all kinds of means, except the one without which no amelioration of the people's condition is possible, of ceasing to take away from these people the land, which is necessary for their maintenance.

The ineffectual and contradictory nature of private charity is discussed in War and Peace as well, and I think there is an important point to make here. For capitalists whose very existence is predicated on the exploitation of labor, resources, and political power, charity, usually done in a way that is contrary to Jesus's expectation that it be done in secret to where the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing, is a way for the capitalist to feel that one is doing good and leaving a positive impact on the earth. However, when the evil that they do in the name of economics or political power is weighed against their private charity, then we can clearly see that they are a net negative on society.

Nobody is amazed at such phenomena as that the successors of Christ bless the murderers who are lined up and hold the guns which are loaded for their brothers ; that the priests, the pastors of all kinds of Christian confessions, always, as inevitably as the executioners, take part in executions, with their presence recognizing the murder as compatible with Christianity (at an electrocution in America, a preacher was present).

That the church supports war and the death penalty is the ultimate contradiction of Christianity, a religion founded around the execution of its originator. Religious hypocrisy that supports violence and the power of the state is mirrored by liberal hypocrisy that professes peace but at the end of the day endorses murders and executions.

Nor is any one surprised at the way the liberal science proves, by the side of the assumption of equality, fraternity, liberty, the necessity of an army, of executions, custom houses, the censorship, the regulation of prostitution, the expulsion of cheap labour, and the prohibition of immigration, and the necessity and justice of colonization, which is based on the poisoning, plundering, and destruction of whole tribes of men who are called savage, and so forth.

It is hard not to see how the French and then later the Russian revolutions fit this pattern perfectly, as they were built on the idea of equality and giving power to the people but at the end of the day resorted to using violence, building up the army to fight wars, taking control of the press, (Tolstoy's loathing of sex workers has been discussed elsewhere), exploiting workers, limiting the free movement of people, and violence based on ethnic group or geography. And all of this has occurred in America, no matter the political party of those in power. For Tolstoy, these conditions will not improve through liberal reformations or economic security, but will actually only lead to an increase in the power of the state.

The more people shall have to eat, the more there shall be of telegraphs, telephones, books, newspapers, journals, the more means will there be for the dissemination of discordant lies and of hypocrisy, and the more will men be disunited and, therefore, wretched, as is indeed the case at present.

Economic increases leading to moral decreases is the least surprising of Tolstoy's beliefs and here the doctrine is demonstrated by the way that it entrenches the current moral order. People are much less likely to change when they are comfortable. When technology makes life easier, they are not likely to demand political or societal changes, and instead find themselves falling into a hypocritical view of life and lack of empathy towards their fellow human, especially those not integrated into their technological comfort.

But let each man at once in his life, according to his strength, profess the truth, as he knows it, or let him at least not defend the untruth, which he does, giving it out as the truth, and there would at once, in this present year 1893, take place such changes in the direction of the emancipation of men and the establishment of truth upon earth as we do not dare even to dream of for centuries to come.

The truth is an important concept in Tolstoy in general, but this part in particular. At the very least, a non-hypocritical life consists in not defending what is untrue and harmful to the people around them. Comfortable liberal hypocrisy does not lead to change. Confronting the violence of our world and the contributions capitalism and state power have in that violence is the first step to transforming the world. The first step is acceptance and it is through this acceptance that we can have optimism that radical change can happen. The world will not change if we embrace liberal hypocrisy and participation in power structures. By accepting the truth that people should be free and that the world can be different, the moral conception of the world can change and our interactions with each other can be based on love rather than our relationship with state powers.

One fortune acquired by the trade in articles necessary for the masses or by corrupting the people, or by speculations on 'Change, or by the acquisition of cheap land, which later grows more expensive on account of the popular want, or by the establishment of plants ruining the health and the life of men, or by civil or military service to the state, or by any means which pamper to the vices of men — a fortune gained by such means, not only with the consent, but even with the approval of the leaders of society, corrupts people incomparably more than millions of thefts, rascalities, plunderings, which are committed outside the forms recognized by law and subject to criminal prosecution.

Tolstoy has many different examples as the one above, but I wanted to highlight the most business related one for Tolstoy's powerful statement that the actions of a single corporation is more harmful than the collection of criminals. In our culture, there is a lot of emphasis placed on crime and what individuals' relationship with each others property is. However, petty theft and small-scale violence has a much smaller effect on our society than the actions of corporations or extremely wealthy men. Their existence is much more threatening to society at large than the actions of criminals, not just because they effect more people in general, but because they are defended more. As Tolstoy himself says in the part, almost no one defends a violent theft but many people defend the actions of a big business, even when their harm is readily apparent.

We talk of the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. But the hypocrisy of the men of our time far surpasses the comparatively innocent hypocrisy of the Pharisees. They had at least an external religious law, in the fulfilment of which they could overlook their obligations in relation to their neighbours, and, besides, these obligations were at that time not yet clearly pointed out ; in our time, in the first place, there is no such religious law which frees men from their obligations to their neighbours, to all their neighbours without exception

Tolstoy's understanding of the Pharisees follows church tradition, in which they are much more interested in the meaning and observance of the law than the are the betterment of the people around them. This works with the discussion of law in the post on the last part. Liberals and defenders of the government put an emphasis on the law and how the law should be followed, often to the detriment of the people that the law harms. For Tolstoy, the worst thing is that they should know better since their moral conception, which has been progressing from generation to generation, tells them what they are doing is wrong.

Though there are among the rich some honest people, — fortunately I meet more and more of them, especially among the young and among women, — who, at the mention of how and with what their pleasures are bought, do not try to conceal the truth, and grasp their heads and say, " Oh, do not speak of it. If it is so, it is impossible to go on living;" though there are such sincere people, who, unable to free themselves from their sin, none the less see it, the vast majority of the men of our time have so entered into their role of hypocrisy, that they boldly deny what is so startlingly obvious to every seeing person.

This is the most common alternative to liberal hypocrisy which is willful ignorance. One wonders if this is not even more common in our time than liberal hypocrisy. These are the kinds of people that see videos of animals being slaughtered and instead of trying to defend it and say it is necessary, say that they do not want to think about it. Tolstoy calls these people sincere and they do not really appear in War and Peace, especially in the numbers that liberal hypocrites or staunch conservatives do, but one wonders if they should be held at a higher plane.

The hypocrisy of our time, which is supported from two sides, by the quasi-religion and the quasi-science, has reached such a point that, if we did not live in the midst of it, we should not be able to believe that men could reach such a degree of self-deception. The people have in our time reached the remarkable state when their hearts are so hardened that they look and do not see, that they listen and do not hear or understand. Men have long been living a life which is contrary to their consciousness.

Again, contradictions are important and the basis of current human life. We have, mostly, replaced religious authority with the authority of seemingly rational thinking (derisively called "science" by Tolstoy, I am not sure what to call it as an alternative, but anti-science in our time generally means a rejection of evolution, global warming, or vaccination) that has the same purpose: to justify our actions and serve state power, which causes people to live against the way they know they should live.

the modern man needs only make an effort of his consciousness, needs only doubt in the reality of what his own and the surrounding hypocrisy presents to him, and ask himself whether it is not all a deception, in order that he may immediately feel himself at once passing over, like the awakened man, from the imaginary, terrible world to the real, to the calm and joyous reality. This man need not perform any acts or exploits, but has only to make an internal effort of consciousness.

Just like the hypnotized man in the previous part, the analogy of waking up to show progress in the moral consciousness is like the allegory of the cave in Plato. But rather than having to do with the forms or epistemology, this has to do with moral awakening. The moral order put forth by liberal hypocrites and the state they serve is a false world and rather than action against this world, whether reformation or revolution, the internal change of each human being is necessary to reveal the real world as it could be.