With truly amazing candor he described conditions and explained
how they had been brought about. He begged the soldiers not to lay down
their arms, but to fight with new courage. Kerensky followed with a long
speech, noble and full of pathos. In some respects, it was the most
powerful of all the appeals it fell to his lot to make to his people, who
were staggering in the too strong sunlight of an unfamiliar freedom. He
did not lack courage to speak plainly: "My heart and soul are uneasy. I am
greatly worried and I must say so openly, no matter what ... the
consequences will be. The process of resurrecting the country's creative
forces for the purpose of establishing the new regime rests on the basis of
liberty and personal responsibility.... A century of slavery has not only
demoralized the government and transformed the old officials into a band of
traitors, _but it has also destroyed in the people themselves the
consciousness of their responsibility for their fate, their country's
destiny_." It was in this address that he cried out in his anguish: "I
regret that I did not die two months ago. I would have died happy with the
dream that the flame of a new life has been kindled in Russia, hopeful of a
time when we could respect one another's right without resorting to the
knout.
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