Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1939, Page 370
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LE NORD
the most indispensable factor in the building up of a state — as
well as a statesman of extraordinary intellectual background. As
the spokesman of a small, and, at that time, a forgotten country,
Johan Wilhelm Snellman has been practically unknown to the
outer world; in fact, his name does not mean as much in the
Northern Countries as one would assume. But in spite of this it
cannot be denied that even from a west-European point of view
Snellman, the Finnish statesman, because of his alert mind, his
versality and unusual personality was a statesman of the highest
calibre.
It is essential to note that the great Finnish statesman of the
North was thoroughly democratic. Moreover, he was a man who
always took a firm, critical attitude toward all matters, and above
all, tried to seek the truth. Snellman’s liberal and democratic con-
ception of the world did not prevent him from critisizing demo-
cracy with its weaknesses; and every reader of his aforementioned
“Statslára” cannot help but be impressed with his honest criticism
based on sound arguments, lucid views and inspiring thoughts.
Surely, Snellman was a man who lived before his time, for his
ideas are as interesting to modern democratic minds as they were
to those who lived in the era in which he wrote.
In a statement published in the “Litteraturbladet” (1863)
Snellman says that actually nations strive for political liberty
“merely for its own sake and because it constitutes a human goal,
and the essence of liberty is to obey the law contained in it”. Cer-
tainly this is sufficient to show how deeply Snellman was imbued
with the zeal for democracy. — And at the same time as he firmly
believed that the birth and success of democracy are decidedly
dependent upon the cultural plane of each nation, he had infinite
faith in the future of the democratic state, for in 1859 he wrote:
“¥e firmly believe that the age of liberal institutions will
eventually dawn everywhere in Europe”. — And several years
later he added this interesting thought to the preceding statement:
“There does not exist a nation in the world which has attained
a liberal constitution too late; but too many of them have put it
to the test too early, thus being compelled to abandon it again”-
The fact that Snellman’s personality and enterprises were
made up of many contradictory elements, — which, however,
on closer scrutiny actually were not so very different, — marks
one of the peculiarities characteristic of his life and work. The
fight he carried on in his native country for the rights of the al-