Political Thought

The fullest exposition of Terlecki’s political ideas is to be found in his book-length tract, The Address of a Ruthenian. Its ornate style, which smacks of pulpit oratory, contrasts perceptibly with the matter-of-fact, simple narrative of the later “Reminiscences.”

Terlecki treated political issues as a churchman.

Terlecki’s basic religious-ecclesiastical orientation, however, did not make him reactionary. “We declare that we are sincere and hearty sup­porters of every kind of decent civic liberty and equality. We respect the will of the people and we bow before it, because we frequently perceive in it a divine inspiration... but we have never been and are not its idol­aters; we do not recognize it as infallible, which pertains to God alone’’ (5). Thus the political creed of Terlecki may be fairly defined as Chris­tian-democratic. He paid tribute to Pius IX, who, “inspired by Heaven and understanding the needs of the time, introduces salutary improve­ments,’’ and who, “by uniting freedom with faith, lays the cornerstone of a future ordering of society” (3).

The beginning of the Address strangely resembles that of the Commu­nist Manifesto. “A specter is haunting Europe—the specter of Commu­nism,” Marx and Engels proclaimed in 1848.

Terlecki proceeded by drawing a sketch of the history of the Slavic peoples. This resume, which forms the largest part of the book, shows that he was well-read and knowledgeable. Usually he did not cite his au­thorities, but he referred occasionally to Nestor’s chronicle and Karam­zin, and also mentioned such leading Slavic scholars as Dobrovsky, Safank, and Kopitar. Terlecki had both erudition and a comprehensive vision, yet his approach to history was essentially uncritical. He had the capacity to believe what he wanted to believe. Thus, for instance, he as­sumed that the Illyrians and other ancient peoples of the Balkan penin­sula were Slavs. By upholding this theory, long discredited among se­rious scholars, Terlecki was able to assert that the Gospel had been first preached to the Slavs by St. Paul (because he had stayed in Thessalon- ica), and that St. Jerome and the Emperor Justinian were Slavs (because of their Illyrian origin). He also accepted as historically true the legend about the visit of the apostle St. Andrew to the future site of Kiev, and believed that Sts. Cyril and Methodius, the originators of the Slavonic liturgy, were themselves Slavs. Terlecki^,s account becomes more accu­rate and reliable when dealing with more recent history, but the selection and interpretation of facts is always dominated by a strong religious bias.

According to Terlecki, all Slavs had been converted to Christianity in the Catholic faith, although under two rites, the Latin and the Greek Slavonic; Cyril and Methodius were Catholics, and their work was en­dorsed by the pope.

Look for yourself, dearest brethren, is it not true that Orthodoxy has everywhere fallen into a heavy bondage to secular power, and is not this bondage heaviest in those countries where the govern­ment claims to be Orthodox? Because there it has despoiled Mother Church of all possessions, it has sacrilegiously erected itself as head of the church, rules her contemptuously through a colonel of dragoons or hussars, and holds the entire clergy in humiliation and ignorance. Is it not true that Orthodoxy is everywhere an instru­ment of obscurantism and of material and spiritual despotism? (83)

To put it briefly, Orthodoxy was nothing but “a petrified, corpse-like church, which gives no sign of life save hatred of Catholicism” (18).

So far, Terlecki⁵S ideas are rather commonplace and do not transcend the limits of typical nineteenth-century Catholic apologetics.

You adhere with your souls to your rite, which you celebrate in the ancestral language. We, however, who are writing this Address, are of the same rite, and we also celebrate all rituals in the same language and according to the same tradition. We are proud to be attached with our heart to all the customs of our forefathers, begin­ning with Sts. Cyril, Methodius, Olha, Volodymyr, Antonii Pechersky, and others, who, like ourselves, were Catholics and of the Greek Slavonic Rite. (84-5)

But Terlecki was painfully aware that reality often diverged from this ideal model, and he stated boldly: “We Slavs of the Greek Slavonic rite have many grievances against Rome” (21). He exonerated the papacy from any direct blame: the popes have many times expressed respect for Eastern traditions, and have defended the rights of the Oriental Catholic churches. But the good intentions of the popes have been frustrated by

the tendencies and efforts of a part of the Latin clergy, and some­times even of the high dignitaries of the Roman church. Having a one-sided view of the church, derived from the perspective of their own rite, and guided by an intemperate and unwise zeal, they have wished and tried to reduce the whole church to the one Latin form, and they have thereby caused her incalculable harm....

But Terlecki was confident that these errors could be rectified, and he did not hesitate to propose definite measures to that effect. The proposals formulated in the Address are identical to those already to be found in the memoranda to Pius IX of 1846 and 1848: the appointment of cardinals representing all Eastern rites, and the formation within the Roman Curia of a special congregation for the affairs of the Oriental churches.⁴⁶ More­over, the term “Uniates” should no longer be applied to Eastern Catho­lics. This term was inappropriate, and even offensive, because it implied incomplete catholicity, as if these rites were only externally tacked onto the Catholic church, instead of being her organic parts. “What would people say if England and Germany, after a return from Protestantism to the bosom of the Western church, were to be labelled Uniate? Surely the whole world would consider this nonsense. And yet this very nonsense has been perpetuated, and is still being perpetuated to this day, against us” (46).

Terlecki discussed in some detail the history of three Slavic nations, Poland, Russia, and Rus’ (Ukraine). He traced the rise of Poland from her medieval beginnings to her position as the leading power of Eastern Europe, attained through the union with Lithuania and Rus’. But the powerful and brilliant Polish Commonwealth of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries already contained the seeds of its future downfall. The primary cause of decline was Poland’s betrayal of her Slavic voca­tion. “Constantly drawing close to Western countries, she began to de­tach herself from the Slavic family” (37). Poland abandoned western Slavic tribes, including her own Silesia, to Germanization, and failed to provide leadership to eastern and southern Slavs in the struggle against the Tatars and Turks.⁴⁷ Poland’s second failure was the restriction of liberty to the noble class only, while the masses were kept in degrading bondage.

The partitions of Poland were, therefore, a just punishment for her sins. Subsequent insurrections and the factious, convulsive efforts of the Polish exiles only plunged the nation into greater misery. “It must, how­ever, be acknowledged that by her sufferings and groans Poland has awakened national consciousness among the other peoples of the Slavic race, which have been slumbering in a long sleep of indifference. She is the only one among the whole Slavic race to have raised the banner of so­cial progress, under the watchwords of liberty, equality, and fraternity” (41).

Turning to the second great Slavic nation, Terlecki asserted that the Russian state had been formed under the impact of the Tatar overlords in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. “This was the school in which the grand dukes of Moscow learned the arts of autocratic despotism” (61). The history of Russia is that of the rulers rather than of the people. “The entire state is like a dead machine, moved by the tsar’s hand, en­livened only by his will” (67). The Russian government, “the most cun­ning and the most treacherous, flexible yet pitiless, ready to use the most immoral means, stubborn in the pursuit of its goals, has been set by des­tiny on the course of conquest” (61). Muscovite autocracy has subju­gated the Orthodox church and transformed the aristocracy of the boiars into a bureaucracy of chinovniks. Peter, “called the Great,” borrowed from Europe only that which served the consolidation of autocracy and the increase of the power of the state; he gave Russia a deceptive Euro­pean appearance. “The [Russian] system of administration is thoroughly immoral, it is based on exploitation and theft, and it has fostered spying and bribery on an unheard-of scale” (67). A total suppression of freedom of expression and “a public education capable of training slaves only” (68) are the tsarist government’s favourite devices. Moreover, tsarism “strives to impose on all distinct nationalities the Russian language and nationality. Therefore, the Ruthenians and Poles suffer also in this re­spect a great oppression” (72). Everything which pertains to the official sphere—in the army, the civil service, and the schools—must be trans­acted in Russian, and serves the policy of Russification. The languages and customs of the non-Russian nationalities find refuge only in peasant huts and the privacy of family life.⁴⁸

It is to be noted that Terlecki’s anti-Russian diatribe was directed only against the Russian state and the tsarist regime, not against the Russian people. The latter “possess all the fine traits of the Slavic character” (72). On this important point Terlecki’s interpretation differed radically from the theories of his colleague from the Hotel Lambert circle, Francis- zek Duchinski. According to Duchinski, the Russians, in contradistinc­tion to both Ukrainians and Poles, did not belong at all to the Slavic “race”; in reality, they were linguistically Slavicized “Turanians” and displayed an altogether non-Slavic national character.⁴⁹

Terlecki’s low opinion of the Russian Orthodox Church has already been observed. On the other hand, he spoke with noticeable sympathy of the Old Believers, whom he valued as a movement of popular resistance against the corrupt official church, and he hinted that the Old Believers might be susceptible to the attraction of Catholicism.⁵⁰ The tsarist state, strongly identified with Orthodoxy, was, according to Terlecki, implac­ably hostile to the Catholic church, but especially to its Eastern rite.

The Russian government has furiously attacked, in the first place, the Greek Slavonic Catholic Church, whose very existence was like a reproach of conscience to the Russian church. The world knows the treacherous and cruel persecutions under which the major part of that church has succumbed.... The two persecutions under

Catherine [II] and Nicholas [I] have deprived the Catholic church of some five million faithful. (71)

Therefore, “one can feel only pity for the delusion of many Catholics who hope for a conversion of the emperor and the people of Russia” (72).⁵¹ Short of a miracle, this cannot occur as long as the present politi­cal system in Russia persists. It is true that the tsarist government enter­tains diplomatic relations with Rome, but its purpose is to elicit the Holy See’s acquiescence in the faits accomplis perpetrated against the Eastern Catholics. “And we must confess with pain that in all the dealings be­tween the Russian government and Rome, including the latest transaction (if it may be so called) signed by Cardinal Lambruschini and Bliudov,⁵² Rome has always been the deceived and duped party, with great harm to the Faith” (71).

The history of the third great Slavic nation, Rus’ (Ukraine), was, ac­cording to Terlecki, closely interwoven with that of her neighbours, Po­land and Russia. But he insisted on the existence of a separate Ruthenian (Ukrainian) national identity. “Rus’ was absorbed [in the fourteenth century] into Lithuania, and later into Poland, but she always retained her distinct national characteristics” (55). Terlecki asserted even more emphatically the Ruthenians’ distinctiveness from the Russians.

In the first place, we consider it a duty of our conscience to protest against the fraudulent incorporation of Ruthenian nationality, his­tory, and literature into Russian nationality, history, and litera­ture. The Russian government would like to convince everybody, including the Ruthenians themselves, that the latter were always the same as the Russians. Russian writers, prompted by their gov­ernment or terrorized by censorship and the fear of punishment, try to outdo one another in spreading this opinion. This act of rob­bery, which the Russian government perpetrates in the field of his­tory and letters, equals those which it commits in stealing territo­ries. We, however, in the name of all of Rus’, most solemnly protest against this robbery. Our common people, too, oppose it by the term moskal (Muscovite), which they use to differentiate the Great Russians from themselves. (51-2)

Terlecki considered the medieval Kievan State as appertaining to Ruthenian (Ukrainian) and not to Russian national history. In point of fact, “the land and the population which served as the nucleus of present-day Russia used to belong to the old Ruthenian state.... But the spirit and the direction of development [of the two nations] were altogether different” (52). After the Mongol invasions, Rus’ merged with Lithuania and Poland, and the Ruthenian nobility gradually became Polonized.

But the people retained their native traits, and they possessed in Zaporozhian Cossackdom the basis of a social development which conformed with their hearts’ aspirations. The Zaporozhian Cos­sacks were like a military order of Rus’, and they formed a truly Christian and Slavic community. Free and equal, they appointed leaders through elections by all. Toward elected leaders, they were admirably obedient. (56)

Terlecki spoke with enthusiasm of the Cossack struggles with the Crimean Tatars and of their daring naval expeditions against the Ottoman Empire. According to Terlecki, Cossackdom, which “during that era had concentrated in itself the Ruthenian nationality,’’ was “a seed rich in promise for all Slavs”; it was predestined “to occupy a high position in Europe, because it had already begun to implement Christian principles [of freedom and equality] in life and social relations. It might have at­tained permanence, and thus it would also have saved Poland” (56). The reasons why these potentialities did not materialize were religious schism and the failure to establish a Ruthenian Catholic patriarchate in Kiev. The imposition of the Latin rite by the Polish Jesuits and the oppression of Ruthenian Cossacks and peasants by the Polish nobility caused a reac­tion in favour of Orthodoxy. Protracted Cossack-Polish wars ensued, which were the cause of the downfall of both adversaries, from which Russia cleverly drew profit.

A large part of the Cossacks, however, felt such a strong revulsion against the servile Russian element that after the annexation of Ukraine⁵³ they emigrated to Turkey, and preferred to preserve old liberties under the protection of their [former] greatest enemies than to submit to the yoke prepared for them by the Russian gov­ernment. Turkey granted them all their ancient liberties, and until 1828 a free Cossackdom continued to exist on the Danube. (57)

A basic tenet of Terlecki⁵s interpretation of Ukrainian history was his conviction that Eastern Catholicism-Combining loyalty to the Church Universal with adherence to the Greek Slavonic rite —had been chosen by Providence as the national religion of the Ruthenian (Ukrainian) people. He believed that “even after the breaking of unity with Rome by Cerularius, Rus’ remained Catholic and for a long time hesitated between Rome and Constantinople” (54). He listed lovingly (not without exag­geration and stretching of historical evidence) all the instances of rap­prochement between Rus’ and the Roman Catholic church. In connection with the Council of Florence (1439) and the Union adopted by it, Ter- Iecki exclaimed rapturously: “Let us rejoice in the sight of the righteous­ness of our Rus’, which at this council, in the person of her worthy repre­sentative, [Metropolitan] Isidore, as well as in later times, has always demonstrated her willingness to recognize and to accept [Catholic] truth. God willing, Rus’ will become the great intermediary between the Roman church and our separated Slavic brethren. Glory be to thee, eter­nal glory, oh our Country, we may indeed be proud in calling ourselves thy sons!” (19).

Having completed the survey of Slavic history, Terlecki proceeded to sketch the present condition of the Slavic peoples and to formulate proposals for their future organization. Because there are more than 80 million Slavs, “Nobody can any more deny today the existence of a Slavic movement” (73). Three factors have chiefly contributed to the Slavic revival in recent decades: first, Poland’s sufferings and struggle for independence, which have had strong repercussions among other Slavic peoples; second, the labours of Czech scholars, which have awakened interest in Slavic historical and literary studies; and third, the wars of Russia with Turkey and the campaigns of Russian armies south of the Danube, which have kindled the hopes of the Balkan Slavs. So far, however, the Slavic movement has “lacked a focus, a distinct flag under which it could unite” (76). The Slavs are, regrettably, divided by denominational and national differences. “Thus the Slavic movement, although encompassing a vast territory and a huge population, remains disorganized and unco-ordinated” (78). The Russian government has in the past, for its own selfish purposes, encouraged the stirrings among the foreign Slavs. But “Russian Pan-Slavism is in reality tsar-Slavism” (73). The libertarian character of the Slavic movement inevitably alienates it from official Russia. The tsarist government apprehends the danger of a national rebirth of the Slavic peoples under its rule. “This ex­plains why in recent years the Russian government has become indif­ferent toward Pan-Slavism, why it has prohibited school teachers from spreading this idea, and why it has severely punished its most zealous partisans, the Ruthenians Shevchenko, Kulesha (sic), and others, by con­demning them to perpetual hard labour in the mines and to lifelong mili­tary service” (77).⁵⁴

The Slavic peoples possess the feeling of racial kinship, but simultane­ously they are aware of their individual national identities. The merger of all Slavs into a single nationality is undesirable, as it could make them a danger to mankind. “In our opinion, the organization of Slavdom could be very much advanced... by its differentiation into six major nationali­ties, viz., the Polish, the Czecho-Moravian, the Illyrian-Croatian- Serbian, the Ruthenian, the Bulgarian, and the Russian. Into them should be incorporated all the minor subdivisions” (80). These six leading Slavic nations should unite in a broader federation.

We postulate, therefore, a federal union of the entire Slavic race. The striving toward such a union is in evidence even now. This will be a great Slavic union, in the spirit of God, and with free develop­ment of the particular nationalities.... Every Slavic nation will or­ganize according to its own needs and will possess a separate gov­ernment. These will be fused in a central government which will provide unity and direction to the whole. (93)

The institutions of the future Slavic federation would be democratic. Ter- Iecki believed that the Slavs’ innate “inclination toward democracy be­came manifest whenever they succeeded in throwing off the [foreign] yoke” (74). “The Slavic spirit calls for an elective authority” (93).⁵⁵ Terlecki did not advance any specific recommendations for the ordering of the future Slavic commonwealth. He stressed, however, that Slavic democracy would differ from that of the Western countries by the ab­sence of materialistic greed, selfish interests, and political factionalism. Elections will be prepared for not by partisan agitation but by fasting, penitence, and public prayers. The voters and the elected, the people, the council (legislature), and the government will be organically united by one pervasive religious spirit.

Terlecki assigned to individual Slavic peoples specific tasks within the framework of the great common enterprise. “To Poland belongs the leadership. Among the Slavic family, she has acquired the greatest merits in the sight of God and mankind. She has many times protected the Church of God and Europe against grave dangers. Of all the Slavic peoples she possesses the greatest spiritual resources in her bards,⁵⁶ her literature, and her legislature” (89). Poland, it is true, has deviated from her vocation by her subservience to Western influences and her indif­ference to the Slavic cause. But if she repents, she will at once resume her place at the head of the Slavic peoples, especially those of the Latin persuasion. The peculiar vocation of the Czechs is to provide an example to all Slavs in the field of intellectual endeavour and scholarship. More­over, they must bear the brunt of the defence of the Slavic world against the pressure of the Germans. The “Illyrians” (i.e., the Yugoslav peoples) and the Bulgarians are predestined to bring to an end Turkish rule in Europe and “to plant the cross, the symbol of salvation, liberty, and social progress... on the tops of the minarets” (92). The Illyrians will create a Slavic fleet on the Adriatic, as the Bulgarians and the Ruthenians will do on the Black Sea, the Poles on the Baltic, and the Russians on the Arctic Sea. This will make possible “the establishment of a Slavic naval power, relations with other nations overseas, and the supplying of the Slavs with Asian and African products and the rich foods OfWestern Europe” (91).⁵⁷ Finally, the “Catholic-national-Slavic spirit” will also penetrate Russia, consume the Mongol element in her government, transform her present anti-Christian social structure, “and the Russian nation will then enter the ranks of the united, fraternal Slavic peoples” (92). A regenerated Russia will become the apostle of Chris­tianity and civilization to Asia.

Terlecki advocated close Polish-Ukrainian co-operation. He consid­ered Poland the natural leader of the “Latin” Slavic peoples, and Rus^,- Ukraine of those of the Greek Slavonic tradition. “The alliance of Rus’ and Poland, based on mutual freedom, is necessary for the future of Slav­dom.... It would help the Poles’ reintegration into the Slavic move­ment, and it would allow the Ruthenians to raise the Greek Catholic Church, and to develop their nationality and language” (81-2). The al­liance between Rus’ and Poland was to become the cornerstone of the projected Pan-Slavic federation. “On their linking depends the harmonization of the whole [Slavic] race” (90).

In regard to his own nation, Terlecki believed that it was endowed with a great and glorious mission. Speaking of Ukrainian history, he stated:

The location of Rus’ near the centre of the Slavic world, a dialect most closely approximating the maternal language and, therefore, to this day the most comprehensible to all other Slavs,⁵⁸ the eleva­tion of Kiev to a supreme spiritual position which made of it among the Slavs of the Eastern rite almost the equivalent of Rome in the entire Church of God,⁵⁹ continuous neighbourly relations with Poland and Hungary (two Catholic countries of the Latin Rite)—all this seemed marvelously to favour the development of Rus’ in the direction of this idea:... to keep all Slavic tribes in Catholic unity. (53)

Rus’ has been unable to accomplish this task in the past, but she will do it in the future. “Rus’, which is already Catholic in part, is predestined to bring back to Catholic unity all the Slavs of the Slavonic rite and to preside over their spiritual development” (91).

Terlecki’s Place in the Evolution of Ukrainian Political Thought The only Ukrainian scholar to have discussed Terlecki’s ideas was Ivan Franko, as long ago as 1906. (Neither Ivan Krevetsky nor Elie Borschak, who have written on Terlecki’s life, has paid attention to his political program.) Franko’s opinion of the Address of a Ruthenian is worth quot­ing: “This was the most brilliant and—in spite of many factual mistakes and an erroneous a priori tendency—the most broadly conceived publi­cists production of the Ukrainian mind during the entire 1850s, a work informed by a great talent and inspired by an ardent and, if we may say so, unfeigned enthusiasm for and love of Ukraine.” Franko goes on to say that Terlecki’s essay contains ideas which “we rediscover thirty years later, in a different stylization and bolstered by other arguments, in the best writings of Drahomanov, such as Po voprosu î malorusskoi li­terature (Concerning the Question of Little Russian Literature, 1876) and Istoricheskaia Polsha ³ Velikorusskaia demokratiia (Historical Poland and Great Russian Democracy, 1882).”⁶⁰

This praise is the more noteworthy as Franko, the sober and critical scholar, felt no sympathy for Terlecki’s visionary flights. Franko’s ar­ticle contains a number of ironical comments on Terlecki’s wishful think­ing and deviations from strict historical truth. The parallel which Franko draws between Terlecki and Drahomanov may at first appear surprising. Although only one generation apart chronologically, the two men be­longed intellectually to different worlds. Terlecki was a son of the Romantic age, Drahomanov of Positivism. Franko was certainly not un­aware of the gulf which separated the priest from the freethinker and ad­vocate of radical secularism. Still, he was not mistaken in stressing the link between them. The common element consisted in democratic feder­alism. Democratic-populist and federalist notions were a recurrent theme in Ukrainian ideologies, from the Society of United Slavs in the 1820s to Drahomanov and later to Mykhailo Hrushevsky and the 1917 Revolu­tion. Thus Ivan Franko testifies to the fact that Terlecki’s program must be considered as belonging to the mainstream of nineteenth-century Ukrainian political thought.

There is another parallel, much closer both in time and in substance, which Franko failed to draw. I am referring to the obvious similarity of Terlecki’s ideas to those of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society.⁶¹ This omis­sion is probably to be explained by the circumstance that in Franko’s day the papers of the Society were still hidden in tsarist police archives and, therefore, its program was not completely available to scholars. The main document that expresses the ideology of the Society, Kostomarov’s Knyhy bytiia ukrainskoho narodu (The Books of the Genesis of the Ukrainian People), was published only in 1918. The Polish historian Marceli Handelsman, writing in the 1930s, was the first to assert that the ideas of Terlecki were “strangely similar, almost identical” with the statutes of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society.⁶²

A student of the history of Ukrainian political thought has identified the four main planks of the Cyrillo-Methodians’ program as social Chris­tianity, egalitarian democracy, Ukrainian messianism, and Slavic feder­alism.⁶³ All these components are also to be found, with some modifica­tions in emphasis, in Terlecki. Despite his sincere concern for the wel­fare of the common man and his execration of serfdom, Terlecki^,s preoc­cupation with the peasant problem was not as central as in the case of the Cyrillo-Methodians; he was less of a narodnik (populist). In addition, as Handelsman has rightly seen, there are two points in which the ideas of IheAddress markedly diverge from those contained in theKnyhy bytiia.^β4 Both programs had a strong religious colouring, but of dissimilar hues. While Terlecki in 1849 was a militant Catholic and believed in the histor­ical mission of the Uniate church, the ardent Christian faith of the Cyrillo-Methodians was non-ecclesiastical and of a distinctly non­conformist character, near to the spirit of radical Protestantism.⁶⁵ Secondly, Terlecki’s concept of a Ukrainian-Polish alliance as an axis of the future Slavic federation was alien to the Cyrillo-Methodians and would hardly have met with their approval. As most members of the So­ciety were natives of Left-Bank Ukraine, their political thinking took place in a Russo-Ukrainian rather than in a Polish-Ukrainian context.

Still, the extraordinary similarity of the two programs has to be ac­counted for. Are we to assume an impact of the Cyrillo-Methodians’ ideas on Terlecki? As we have seen, Terlecki knew in 1849, although in­accurately, about the arrest and trial of Shevchenko, Kulish, and their as­sociates, which had occurred two years earlier. (It should be noted that he speaks of them as a group of individuals rather than as members of an organization.) But what did he know about the ideology of the “Ruthenian” intellectuals in Kiev? He referred to them briefly in con­nection with his discussion of the Pan-Slavist trend in Russia. In this re­spect, his information was correct. But the Society’s thought contained elements other than Pan-Slavism, such as Ukrainian nationalism, which would have been of interest to Terlecki, and which he failed to mention. Neither did he mention the names of Sts. Cyril and Methodius, used by the Kiev circle. As Terlecki was himself devoted to the cult of the Apostles of the Slavs, to whom he later dedicated his church in Paris, his silence might be considered a sign of ignorance. He certainly had no ac­cess to the Society’s programmatic papers, which were only circulated in a few handwritten copies among members, and were later impounded by the authorities. Terlecki^,s source, Duchinski, reported contemporary Kievan rumors, but he was unable to provide detailed and reliable infor­mation. Thus we reach the conclusion that Terlecki could not have been influenced by the ideas of the Cyrillo-Methodians to any significant de­gree. At most, information about the Ukrainian group in Kiev could have confirmed him in his own convictions, arrived at independently.

The parallels between the Address of a Ruthenian and the program of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society must therefore be explained by their being rooted in the common spirit of the age. Ideas of an eschatological, reli­gious, democratic-populist, nationalist, and Pan-Slavic federalist charac­ter were “in the air’’ of all East European countries around the middle of the nineteenth century. When the first modern Ukrainian political pro­grams were formulated about that time, they were bound to incorporate these intellectual elements and to synthesize them in accordance with the requirements of the specific Ukrainian situation. The broad correspond­ence between the Cyrillo-Methodians’ and Terlecki’s formulations ought to be taken as an indication that some such program indeed represented an adequate response to the challenge of the age. In addition, both Ter- Iecki and the Society were influenced by the writings of the Polish Romanticists, which served them as a model. As a biographer of Kostomarov stated, “There can be no doubt that Kostomarov, Hulak, Shevchenko, Bilozersky, Savych, and other members of the [Cyrillo- Methodian] group experienced the strong impact of Polish political thought, Polish underground organizations, and the writings of Polish poets and publicists.’’⁶⁶ Terlecki drew his inspiration from the same source, and this fact may account for the correspondence between his ideas and those of the Cyrillo-Methodians. It was no mean accomplish­ment of Terlecki to effect single-handedly and unaided an ideological synthesis which bears comparison with the one which emerged from the collective discussions of the brilliant group of Ukrainian intellectuals in Kiev.

The historical fortunes of the two programs, however, were altogether dissimilar. The Cyrillo-Methodian Society existed only for a short time before its suppression by the Russian government, and its original papers disappeared from sight until the downfall of the tsarist regime. Neverthe­less, “the ideas of the Society became the watchword of all Ukrainian ‘awakeners.’”⁶⁷ It can be stated without exaggeration that the Cyrillo- Methodian program, with successive revisions and amendments, served as the ideological cornerstone of the Ukrainian national movement in Russia during the entire second half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, down to the 1917 Revolution. This happened primarily through the powerful impact of Shevchenko’s poetry, and also by the personal influence of several former members of the Society, such as Mykola Kostomarov, Panteleimon Kulish, and Vasyl Bilozersky, who, after their return from exile, became the protagonists of the Ukrainian movement in the 1860s and were able to transmit their leading ideas to the next generation.

Such a constructive historical role was denied Terlecki. It might have been expected that his 1849 program, owing to its strong Uniate bias, would have had a particular appeal to Greek Catholic Ukrainians in Galicia. Franko attests that IheAddress of a Ruthenian was “widely cir­culated in Galicia and diligently read by the older generations of our in­telligentsia.’’⁶⁸ But he adds that in his own time Terlecki’s study and his very person have been virtually forgotten. These words still apply today. As a matter of fact, some of the ideas formulated forcefully and elo­quently in the Address of a Ruthenian were to re-emerge at a later date, proving the vitality of Terlecki’s thinking. For instance, the notion that Ukraine was a Slavic nation completely distinct from Poland and Russia, and the claim that Ukraine, not Russia, was the legitimate heir of medieval Kievan Rus’, are basic to the ideology of modern Ukrainian na­tionalism. The conviction of the historical mission of the Uniate Church has taken a strong hold among Ukrainian Catholics of the Eastern rite, al­though this belief is, of course, rejected by Ukrainians of other denominations. In recent years the Ukrainian diaspora in Western coun­tries has been agitated by the call for a Ukrainian Catholic patriarchate. But all these revivals of ideas originally advanced by Terlecki occurred without any knowledge of his person and work. Hipolit Vladimir Ter- Iecki remains the forgotten man of modern Ukrainian intellectual history.

How can this peculiar state of affairs be explained? In contrast to the Cyrillo-Methodians’ program, which was backed by a group, the pro­gram of the Address of a Ruthenian was the work of a maverick individ­ual. Terlecki never lacked personal friends, but he had no disciples. By his changes of religious and political colours and his return to Russia in 1872, he, in Franko’s words, “gave the lie to his former ideas, expressed in the 1849 brochure.’’⁶⁹ The Ukrainian community retaliated against this apparent act of treachery by expunging Terlecki from its collective memory and casting him into oblivion.

Notes

1. “Hipolit Terlecki” is Polish, and “Vladimir” Russian. I use these forms, which are to be found in contemporary documents. The Ukrainian form of the name is Ippolit Volodymyr Terletsky.

2. Terlecki consistently adhered to the traditional national nomenclature, Rus’, rusyn (Ruthenia, Ruthenian), which he strictly differentiated from Russia, Russian.

3. The account of Terlecki’s life is based mainly on the following sources: (1) His own reminiscences, “Zapiski arkhimandrita Vladimira Terletskogo, byvshego greko- uniatskogo missionera,” Russkaia Starina 63 (1889):1-26, 559-78; 70 (1891):581-601; 71 (1891):351-91. (2) A group of documents from the Vatican ar­chives in A.G. Welykyj, ed., Litterae S.C. de Propaganda Fide Ecclesiam Catho- Hcam Ucrainae et Bielarussiae spectantes (Rome 1957), v. 7. The documents refer mostly to Terlecki’s second Paris period, in the early 1850s. (3) An article of I. Krevetsky, “Vid apostolstva do zrady,” Nova Zoria 4 (1929), no. 45, 3-6. (4 and 5) Two articles of I. Borshchak (E. Borschak): ^llUkrainska katolytska tserkva v Paryzhi sto rokiv tomu,’’ Vistnyk Ukrainskoi Hreko-Katolytskoi Tserkvy è Frantsii (1945), nos. 1 and 3-4 (this article was available to me in a typewritten copy); “Une Eglise Catholique Ukrainienne a Paris il ó a un siecle,⁵⁵ Analecta Ordinis S. Basilii Magni 1 (8), Series 2, Section 2 (Rome 1950), fasc. 2-3:360-63. The two articles of Borshchak, which have the same title, do not coincide fully as to their contents, and each contains some bits of information not duplicated in the other.

4. Borshchak erroneously states that Terlecki was a Uniate by birth. This is con­tradicted by Terlecki⁵S own “Reminiscences.⁵⁵

5. “Zapiski arkhimandrita Vladimira Terletskogo,⁵⁵ Russkaia Starina 63 (1889):23.

6. Ibid., 565.

7. Ibid.

8. Princess Volkonsky was a hostess to Nikolai Gogol during his stay in Rome. I was not able to find evidence of any direct contact between Terlecki and Gogol, although it does not seem impossible chronologically.

9. On the encyclical, In supremi Petri apostoli sede, and its repercussions, see A.M. Ammann, Abriss der Ostslavischen Kirchengeschichte (Vienna 1950), 516; E. Winter, Russland und das Papstum (Berlin 1960-61), 2:270.

10. “Zapiski arkhimandrita Vladimira Terletskogo,⁵⁵ Russkaia Starina 70 (1891):589. It is to be noted that a few years later, in 1856, the Metropolitan of Halych, Mykhailo Levytsky, was appointed cardinal. This was the first instance of the elevation of a Ukrainian bishop to the College of Cardinals. This action of Pius IX may be viewed as a partial fulfillment of his promise to Terlecki. As to the second, more important measure, the creation of a Ukrainian Catholic patriarchate, it remains unfulfilled to this day.

11. “Greek Catholics⁵⁵ was the term used for Eastern-rite Catholics, or Uniates, of the Habsburg Empire.

12. Here ends the part of Terlecki⁵S “Reminiscences⁵⁵ which was accessible to me. I was unable to consult the concluding section, Russkaia Starina 71 (1891):351-91.

13. Slowo Rusina ku wszej braci szczepu Slowiahskiego î rzeczach Slowiahskich (Paris 1849).

14. Quoted in Borschak, “Une Eglise Ukrainienne,⁵⁵ 362. One wonders about the com­position of the congregation to which Terlecki preached his Ukrainian sermons in Paris. The services at the Church of Sts. Cyril and Methodius might have been at­tended by some Polish emigres, natives of Ukraine. They were, however, Roman Catholics of the Latin rite, not Uniates.

15. Several of the documents in Welykyj, Litterae S.C. de Propaganda Fide, v. 7, nos. 3356, 3360, 3368, 3375, 3376, 3377, deal with questions pertaining to the ordina­tion OfTerlecki⁵S pupils, Iuliian Kuilovsky and Teofil Korostensky.

16. On Metropolitan Kuilovsky⁵S biography, see LI. Nazarko, Kyivski ³ halytski mytropolyty: Biohrafichni narysy (1590-1960) (Rome 1962), 214-20.

17. M. Handelsman, Ukraihska polityka ks. Adama Czartoryskiego przed wojnq_ krymska_c (Warsaw 1937), 124-6.

18. According to Terlecki⁵S memoirs, during his stay in Constantinople in 1847 he re­ceived a letter from Prince Czartoryski in which, in guarded terms, a deal was pro­posed: the Prince promised to support Terlecki⁵S unionist action on condition that the latter accept Czartoryski⁵S political leadership. “This condition was, of course, un­acceptable to me.⁵⁵ Russkaia Starina 63 (1889):576.

19. Handelsman mentions the “malicious remarks⁵⁵ published about Terlecki c. 1850 by

the prominent Polish journalist Julian Klaczko. Ukrainska polityka, 120, n. 3.

20. See the letter of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (30 November 1853) to Archbishop Sacconi, the nuncio in Paris. Welykyj, Litterae S.C. de Propa­ganda Fide, V. 7, no. 3374:265-6.

21. The sources available to me do not tell whether Hipolit Terlecki and his son were ever reunited after 1836, and where the son’s death occurred.

22. Welykyj, Litterae S.C. de Propaganda Fide, v. 7, no. 3390 (24 March 1855):274-5.

23. Zoria Halytska, 1851, nos. 20, 21. The article was a report on the Oriental Society and its work. The correspondence is discussed in I. Franko, “Stara Rus’,” Litera- turno-naukovyi vistnyk 36 (1906):368-70.

24. K. Studynsky, ed., Korespondentsiia Iakova Holovatskoho v Iitakh 1850 —62 (Lviv 1905), 273-6.

25. Ibid., 351.

26. Terlecki’s letter of 29 January 1859, ibid., 427-8.

27. K.N. Ustiianovych, M.F. Raievskii ³ rossiiskii panslavizm: Spomyny z perezhytoho ³ peredumanoho (Lviv 1884), 78.

28. The appearance of Terlecki is described in the unpublished memoirs of Platon Kostetsky, quoted in Franko, ‘‘Stara Rus’,” 374.

29. Two variants of the poem, written in 1860, are reprinted in O.V. Dukhnovych, Tvory (Bratislava 1968), 1:335-7.

30. J. Pelesz, Geschichte der Union der ruthenischen Kirche mit Rom (Wurzburg and Vienna 1881), 2:937, n.

31. Welykyj, Litterae S.C. de Propaganda Fide, v. 7, no. 3473 (2 January 1862), 317-18; no. 3483 (13 May 1862), 324.

32. The account of the last period of Terlecki’s life is based exclusively on Krevetsky’s article (see note 3), as other available biographical sources provide no information.

33. It seems quite possible that the denunciation against Terlecki and his arrest were a frame-up arranged to supply the authorities with a pretext for the expulsion of an in­convenient man. We do not know Terlecki’s legal status during his stay in Transcar­pathia and Galicia, but he had probably never acquired Austro-Hungarian citizen­ship, for otherwise he could not have been ordered out of the country.

34. See note 3.

35. See note 13.

36. See above, note 3. The “Reminiscences” were prepared for publication by Ter­lecki’s friend Lev Lopatynsky. Under the pseudonym “L.I. Halychanyn,” Lo- patynsky wrote an article after Terlecki’s death dedicated to his memory, “Staromu druhu,” Slovo, 1889, no. 5. This article, inaccessible to me, could be valuable from the biographical viewpoint.

37. Handelsman, Ukraihska polityka, 120, n. 3.

38. Podrazhaniia Isusa Khrysta, knyzhok chotyry. Sochinenie Tomy z Kempisa (Przemysl 1862), v. 14.

39. Dumy ta dumky Iosypa Bohdana Zaleskoho, perevedeni z polskoho na rodymyi rus- kyi iazyk (Przemysl 1861).

40. Otcherk prazdnychnykh propovidei (Przemysl 1862).

41. Zapysky vtoroho poklonycheskoho puteshestviia z Ryma v Ierusalym ³ inshykh mis- tsiakh Vostoka Sovershennoho (Lviv 1861), 2 fasc.

42. I.E. Levytsky, Halytsko-ruskaia bybliohrafiia XIX Stolitiia, 2 vols. (Lviv 1888-95), 2:12. This work is also the source of information on the items listed in notes 38-41.

43. Studynsky, Korespondentsiia Iakova Holovatskoho, 274, n. 1.

44. They are listed in Levytsky, Halytsko-ruskaia bybliohrafiia, v. 2.

45. Ugorskaia Rus’ ³ Vozrozhdenie soznaniia narodnosti mezhdu russkimi v Vengrii (Kiev 1874).

46. Such a Congregatio pro ecclesia orientali was actually created in 1917, under the pontificate of Benedict XV.

47. Terlecki shared this opinion with his old comrade-in-arms, Michal Czajkowski. The latter’s biographer states: “According to Czajkowski’s historical theories, the cause of Poland’s fall was separation from the common Slavic interest and Slavdom in gen­eral. Because of this, she was dragged along, if I may say so, tied to the tail of West European politics, and became a plaything in the hands of the Germans and other European powers. To correct this age-old error, it was necessary to draw close to the Slavs.” Fr. Rawita-Gawronski, Michal Czaykowski (Sadyk-Pasza). Jego zycie, dzialalnosc wojskowa ³ Iiteracka, 2d ed. (St. Petersburg 1901), 36.

48. Terlecki’s concept of Russian history resembles strikingly the argument of Astolphe de Custine’s La Russie en 1839 (1843). Terlecki does not cite de Custine, but I am convinced that he drew on his famous and much-discussed work.

49. Cf. F.-H. Duchinski (de Kiew), Peuples Aryas et Tourans, Agriculteurs et Nomades. Necessite des reformes dans Vexposition de Vhistoire des peuples Aryas- Europeens et Tourans, particulierement des Slaves et des Moscovites (Paris 1864).

50. It is noteworthy that when in 1907 the Metropolitan of Halych, Andrei Sheptytsky, embarked on his bold unionist action in Russia, he also intended to base it partly on the Old Believers. Cf. C. Korolevskij, Metropolite Andre Szeptyckyj, 1865-1944, Opera TheologicaeSocietatisScientificae Ucrainorum (Rome 1964), 16-17:192 ff.

51. The context suggests that the reference to “many Catholics” who, according to Ter- Iecki, harboured wishful thoughts about the prospects of a conversion of Russia was a covert polemic against the views which he encountered in certain circles of the Roman Curia.

52. The “transaction” alluded to by Terlecki was the concordat between the Holy See and Russia of 3 August 1847 signed by the Cardinal Secretary of State, Luigi Lam- bruschini, and Count Dmitrii Bliudov. The concordat was an attempt to regularize the position of the Latin-rite Catholic church in the Russian Empire, but it bypassed the problem of the Uniates. The Union had been officially suppressed by Nicholas I in 1839, except for the Chelm (Kholm) diocese in Congress Poland. In Terlecki’s in­terpretation, the concordat of 1847 implied Rome’s tacit acceptance of this act.

53. This is the only instance in the Address of the use of the term Ukraine. The context shows that Terlecki understood it in the traditional sense, as the name of the Cossack territory on the Dnieper.

54. It can safely be assumed that Terlecki’s knowledge of the fate of Shevchenko and the other members of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society was derived from Duchinski. The latter, prior to his escape to the West in 1846, resided in Kiev, where he obtained some second-hand information about the existence of a clandestine Ukrainian group. Between January and March 1848 Duchinski published in Prince Czartoryski⁵S Paris organ, Trzeci Maj, a series of articles on the Ukrainian problem, entitled “The Pereiaslav Agreement.” He advocated Polish-Ukrainian co-operation, discussed the oppression of Ukraine by the tsarist government, and mentioned the trial of Shev­chenko, Kulish (whose name he misspelled “Kulesza”), and of several of their asso­ciates (whose names he badly confused). (Excerpts of the Trzeci Maj articles are reprinted in Pisma Franciszka Duchihskiego, 3 vols. [Rapperswil 1901-4] 2:313-25. See also Handelsman, Ukraihska polityka, 2:110-15.) Contrary to Duchinski⁵S erroneous statement, repeated by Terlecki, none of the Cyrillo- Methodians had been condemned to forced labour in the mines.

55. The notion that Slavic peoples are particularly prone to democracy was widespread during the Romantic age. Terlecki most likely obtained it from the writings of the in­fluential Polish emigre historian and publicist, Joachim Lelewel (1786-1861), who postulated gminowladztwo (people’s rule) as the socio-political system of the primeval Slavs.

56. “Bards” Iyvieszcze) was an honorific name given to Poland’s Romantic poets, primarily Mickiewicz, with whom Terlecki was personally acquainted.

57. This point of Terlecki’s program is strangely reminiscent of a passage in the “Rules,” or “Catechism,” of the Society of United Slavs (1823-5): “... (15) You are a Slav, and in your country, on the shores of the four seas which surround it, you shall construct four fleets: Black, White, Dalmatian, and Arctic.... (16) In your ports, î Slav, commerce and naval power will flourish, and justice will reside in the city at the centre of your country.” (Izbrannye sotsialno-politicheskie ³ filosofskie proizvedeniia dekabristov, 3 vols. [Moscow 1951], 3:71-2.) Is this puzzling paral­lelism a mere coincidence? Or do we have the right to speculate that some informa­tion about the United Slavs slipped through to Terlecki? He was a native of Vol- hynia, where the Society had originated; some of its members belonged to the local Polish-Ukrainian gentry. The United Slavs were the branch of the Decembrist move­ment which, despite its lack of a developed Ukrainian national consciousness, must be considered as belonging to the tradition of Ukrainian political thought. The United Slavs’ democratic and federalistic Pan-Slavism found a continuation in the program of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society, on the one hand, and in that of Terlecki on the other.

58. In calling individual Slavic languages “dialects” (narzecza), Terlecki followed a usage common to many nineteenth-century Pan-Slavists. By the “maternal lan­guage” he meant Church Slavonic. The erroneous notion that among the Slavic lan­guages Ukrainian is particularly close to Church Slavonic might have been suggested to Terlecki by the circumstance that a Ukrainized version of Church Slavonic, the so- called Slavonic Ruthenian (slaveno-ruskyi iazyk), served as the literary language of Ukraine until the eighteenth century.

59. Terlecki⁵S idea of the exalted position and spiritual primacy of Kiev derives from the tradition OfUkrainian seventeenth-century thought. The myth of “Kiev, the second Jerusalem” was widespread in Ukraine during the Cossack era. (Cf. Oleksander Ohloblyn, Hetman Mazepa ta ioho doba [New York, Paris, Toronto 1960], 145-7.) This idea is also to be found among some of Terlecki⁵S contemporaries. Mykola Kostomarov, the leader and ideologist of the Cyrillo-Methodian Society, in an un­finished novel, Panych Natalych, puts in the mouth of one of the protagonists the prophecy that “the reconciled Slavs will some day unite in Kiev, ‘the capital of the Slavic race,’ and the bell of St. Sophia [cathedral in Kiev] will announce the deliv­erance of the Slavic peoples.” (G. Luciani, Le Livre de la Genese du peuple ukrain- ien [Paris 1950], 46.) And Terlecki^,s acquaintance and comrade-in-arms during the 1831 insurrection, the Ukrainophile Pole Michal Czajkowski, said in his Powiesci kozackie (1837): “Kiev is the true cradle of the Slavic race....1 have often talked with Slavs of different countries and all agreed that Kiev is an arch-Slavic city.” (Luciani, Le Livre de la Genese, 47.)

60. I. Franko, “Stara Rus’,” Literaturno-naukovyi vistnyk 36, no. 12 (1906):309. This article is not included in the Soviet edition of Franko’s collected works, Tvory, 20 vols. (Kiev 1950-56).

61. Recent works on the Cyrillo-Methodian Society are: B. Yanivsky, ed., Kostomarov's "Books of the Genesis of the Ukrainian People" (New York 1954); P.A. Zaionchkovskii, Kirillo-Mefodievskoe obshchestvo (Moscow 1959); Luciani, Le Livre de la Genese', D. Papazian, “N.I. Kostomarov and the Cyril-Methodian Ideology,” Russian Review 29, no. 1 (January 1970); D. Papazian, “The Trial of the Cyril-Methodians,” The Michigan Academician 3, no. 4 (Spring 1971). See also the relevant chapters in the books of H.Ia. Serhiienko, Suspilno-politychnyi rukh na Ukrainipisliapovstannia dekabrystiv 1826 —1850 (Kiev 1971) and G.S.N. Luckyj, Be­tween Gogol’ and Sevcenko. Polarity in the Literary Ukraine: 1798 —1847 (Munich 1971).

62. Handelsman, Ukraihska poUtyka, 121.

63. Resume of lecture by Ie. Pyziur, Harvard Ukrainian Studies Newsletter 4, nos. 3, 4 (November-December 1972), 15.

64. Handelsman, Ukraihska poUtyka, 121.

65. The religious philosophy of the Cyrillo-Methodians has been discussed by M. Hrushevsky, Z istorii religiinoi dumky na Ukraini (Lviv 1925), 111-24; D. Chy- zhevsky, Narysy z istorii filosofii na Ukraini (Prague 1931), 107-34.

66. D. Doroshenko, Mykola Ivanovych Kostomarov (Leipzig n.d.), 24. The ideological connections between the Cyrillo-Methodians, especially Shevchenko, and their Pol­ish contemporaries have been investigated by V. Shchurat, “Osnovy Shev­chenko vykh zviazkiv z poliakamy” in V.H. Shchurat, Vybrani pratsi z istorii Iite- ratury (Kiev 1963), 242-350. This problem has also been treated, briefly but ade­quately, by Luciani, Le Livre de la Genese, 33-6.

67. I. Borshchak, Introduction to his edition of M. Kostomarov, Knyhy bytiia ukrain- s êî ho narodu (Paris n.d.), 35.

68. Franko, “Stara Rus’,” 359-60.

69. Ibid., 374.