Creatures That Once Were Men | Page 5

it is of
Tolstoy or any of the Tolstoyan type of mind. The very title of this
story strike the note of this sudden and simple vision. The
philanthropist writing long letters to the Daily Telegraph says, of men
living in a slum, that "their degeneration is of such a kind as almost to
pass the limits of the semblance of humanity," and we read the whole
thing with a tepid assent as we should read phrases about the virtues of
Queen Victoria or the dignity of the House of Commons.
The Russian novelist, when he describes a dosshouse, says, "Creatures
that once were Men." And we are arrested, and regard the facts as a
kind of terrible fairy tale. This story is a test case of the Russian
manner, for it is in itself a study of decay, a study of failure, and a
study of old age. And yet the author is forced to write even of staleness
freshly; and though he is treating of the world as seen by eyes darkened
or blood-shot with evil experience, his own eyes look out upon the
scene with a clarity that is almost babyish. Through all runs that
curious Russian sense that every man is only a man, which, if the
Russians ever are a democracy, will make them the most democratic
democracy that the world has ever seen. Take this passage, for instance,
from the austere conclusion of "Creatures that once were Men":
Petunikoff smiled the smile of the conqueror and went back into the
dosshouse, but suddenly he stopped and trembled. At the door facing
him stood an old man with a stick in his hand and a large bag on his
back, a horrible old man in rags and tatters, which covered his bony
figure. He bent under the weight of his burden, and lowered his head on
his breast, as if he wished to attack the merchant.
"What are you? Who are you?" shouted Petunikoff.
"A man . . ." he answered, In a hoarse voice. This hoarseness pleased
and tranquillized Petunikoff, he even smiled.
"A man! And are there really men like you?" Stepping aside, he let the
old man pass. He went, saying slowly:
"Men are of various kinds . . . as God wills . . . There are worse than
me . . . still worse. . . Yes. . . ."
Here, in the very act of describing a kind of a fall from humanity,
Gorky expresses a sense of the strangeness and essential value of the
human being which is far too commonly absent altogether from such

complex civilizations as our own. To no Westerner, I am afraid, would
it occur, when asked what he was, to say, "A man." He would be a
plasterer who had walked from Reading, or an iron-puddler who had
been thrown out of work in Lancashire, or a University man who would
be really most grateful for the loan of five shillings, or the son of a
lieutenant-general living in Brighton, who would not have made such
an application if he had not known that he was talking to another
gentleman. With us it is not a question of men being of various kinds;
with us the kinds are almost different animals. But in spite of all
Gorky's superficial scepticism and brutality, it is to him the fall from
humanity, or the apparent fall from humanity, which is not merely great
and lamentable, but essential and even mystical. The line between man
and the beasts is one of the transcendental essentials of every religion;
and it is, like most of the transcendental things of religion, identical
with the main sentiments of the man of common sense. We feel this
gulf when theologies say that it cannot be crossed. But we feel it quite
as much (and that with a primal shudder) when philosophers or fanciful
writers suggest that it might be crossed. And if any man wishes to
discover whether or no he has really learned to regard the line between
man and brute as merely relative and evolutionary, let him say again to
himself those frightful words, "Creatures that once were Men."
G. K. CHESTERTON.

CREATURES THAT ONCE WERE MEN


PART I
In front of you is the main street, with two rows of miserable-looking
huts with shuttered windows and old walls pressing on each other and
leaning forward. The roofs of these time-worn habitations are full of
holes, and have been patched here and there with laths; from
underneath them project mildewed beams, which are shaded by the
dusty-leaved elder-trees and crooked white willow-- pitiable flora of
those suburbs inhabited by the poor.

The dull green time-stained panes of the windows look upon each other
with the cowardly glances of cheats.