Peter the Great — "I desire that the people should learn and become more enlightened, but I cannot …"
I desire that the people should learn and become more enlightened, but I cannot force them to it.
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More from Peter the Great
"It is better to have a good enemy than a bad friend."
"We are not in the habit of giving away cities."
"Russia needs the sea."
"To educate the people, one must first educate the nobility."
"The beard is a useless burden."
About Peter the Great (1672-1725)
Russian tsar (1682-1725) who Westernized Russia, founded St. Petersburg, and built Russia into a European great power. Closely associated with Catherine the Great (later Westernizing Russian empress). For an intellectual contrast, see Old Believers, Russian Orthodox traditionalist movement that rejected Patriarch Nikon's reforms and Peter's modernization — Peter's beard-shaving decrees, Western dress laws, and calendar changes triggered a religious-cultural schism — the founding poles of Russia's eternal 'European modernity vs Slavic tradition' debate that runs through Slavophiles, Solzhenitsyn, and contemporary Putin-era ideology.