Sign in with Facebook
“But, curiously, Peter did not grasp—perhaps he did not wish to grasp—the political implications of this new view of man. He had not gone to the West to study “the art of government.” Although in Protestant Europe he was surrounded by evidence of the new civil and political rights of individual men embodied in constitutions, bills of rights and parliaments, he did not return to Russia determined to share power with his people. On the contrary, he returned not only determined to change his country but also convinced that if Russia was to be transformed, it was he who must provide both the direction and the motive force. He would try to lead; but where education and persuasion were not enough, he would drive—and if necessary flog—the backward nation forward.”
― Peter the Great: His Life and World
― Peter the Great: His Life and World
“Asking himself how this had happened and what could be done about it, Peter came to understand that the roots of Western technological achievement lay in the freeing of men’s minds. He grasped that it had been the Renaissance and the Reformation, neither of which had ever come to Russia, which had broken the bonds of the medieval church and created an environment where independent philosophical and scientific inquiry as well as wide-ranging commercial enterprise could flourish. He knew that these bonds of religious orthodoxy still existed in Russia, reinforced by peasant folkways and traditions which had endured for centuries. Grimly, Peter resolved to break these bonds on his return.”
― Peter the Great: His Life and World
― Peter the Great: His Life and World
Bella Nabutovsky’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Bella Nabutovsky’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
4,795 books
|
71 friends
120 books
|
23 friends
174 books
|
3 friends
Polls voted on by Bella Nabutovsky
Lists liked by Bella Nabutovsky
