Poetic cosmogony in poems of Russian poets of the 18th – early 19th century

. The research is significant due to the undiminishing interest shown by philosophers, philologists and culture experts to an eternal question of all times – the creation of the world by God. This aspect demands special consideration. That is why, the article aims to define the cosmogony as a part of the historiosophy, more precisely, the poetic cosmogony as a part of the artistic historiosophy. To achieve this aim, it is necessary to answer the following questions: 1) what is the fundamental principle of the world (universe), and is the poet focused on this particular problem? 2) what does this fundamental principle consist of? what are the constituents of the world? 3) how does it show itself? where is it situated? where does it exist? how did the world come into existence? The answers to these questions can be provided not only by religion and theology but also by science, philosophy and mythology. The analysis is carried out on the material of cosmogonical poems of four Russian 18th–19th century poets: “World's Creation. Panegyric Song” (1779–1782) by А. N. Radishchev, “Reflection on World's Creation Based on the First Chapter of Genesis” (1784, 1804) and “The Fate of the Ancient World or the Flood” (1789, 1804) by S. S. Bobrov, “Matter” (1796) by P. А. Slovtsov, “Song to the Creator” (“Pesn' Sotvorivshemu vsja”) (1817) by S. А. Shirinsky-Shikhmatov. The conducted research found out, that all authors of the above writings put into verse versions of the so-called cosmogonic myths reputable for them, which describe how the universe originated, more or less. Four poets rely in their cosmogenesis reflections on some myth invariants to be found in the Old Testament [6], but these are the variants, and sometimes even concepts, alternating to the Bible determine an individual diversity of historiosophical constructs of our “metaphysical” poets. The material from this article can be used in teaching the following disciplines: history, 18th-century Russian literature and philosophy.

As God's creation of the world subject is directly connected with the historiosophical works of thinkers of different years, we also use the historical-philosophical method.
The methodological basis of the article is the Russian and foreign literary critics and philosophers' ideas: the role of religion in the Enlightenment [7], the concept of metaphysical pathos [8], the Orthodox theological context in the odic works of the 18thcentury poets [9].

Introduction
Reflections on God's creation of the world appear as a literary theme in the new Russian poetry somewhere at the turn of the 1770s-1780s.
It must be borne in mind that religious and philosophical poetry phenomenon of the XVIII century arose in the fusion of Christian dogma, Freemasonry, philosophy and several scientific disciplines.
The metaphysical pathos was the 18th-century poets' mean of expressiveness. Sergei Bobrov was, apparently, the Russian poet who first expressed a special "metaphysical pathos" that gradually matured in our poetry since the "Multicolor Garden" ("Vertograd mnogocvetnyj") by Simeon Polotsky in a conscious, consistent and distinct manner. We mean the eternity pathos as "aesthetic pleasure, which gives us a void abstract idea of firmness" [8] and which almost all Russian poets of the 18th-early 19th century enjoy.
The American philosopher and idea historian A.O. Lovejoy introduced the concept of metaphysical pathos and its types. "An example of metaphysical pathos", Lovejoy explains primarily speaking about philosophical creativity, "is any description of the nature of things, environment, in terms that awaken, like verses, their associations, a kind of empathy, a congenial mood or a system of feelings by the philosopher or his readers" [8]. Obviously, philosophers and artists are highly "sensitive" to this pathos. Their inner mental structure enable for them expressing the spiritual quest of their era and its unconscious mental habits more completely, as well as detecting, for example, an intellectual fashion.
Metaphysical preferences to be addressed by this section were reflected in the Russian poetry somewhere in the late 1770s -early 1780s, when well-known and anonymous authors considered the world's creation by the God. This subject is in focus of one of the well-known poems of the 18th century, "God" ("Bog") by G.R. Derzhavin (1780-1784). Along with the eternity pathos, it is inspired by both incredibility and transfiguration pathoses. The latter making sense of the world's creation verses is of a particular interest for us. The aim of the article, therefore, is to consider the historiosophy of the pathos transformation, that is the focus of lyrical works on the creation of the world.

S. Shikhmatov's traditional Bible cosmogenesis
The creation subject of the 18th-century Russian poets is the God of the Old and New Testaments, but they assume degree of His participation at cosmogenesis differently.
The last verses by Shikhmatov are devoted to the first coming of Christ and His redemption of human sins, thus filling the "formula of creation" with a theological content: the creation of the world by the Word means that God the Father created the visible and invisible world through his Only-Begotten Son under the influence of the Holy Spirit [10].
This understanding remains relevant for all metaphysical poets.

"Reflection on the World's Creation ..." by S. Bobrov
While describing the origin of the universe in the poem "Kingdom of Universal Love," («Carstvo vseobshhej ljubvi») Bobrov omitted God the Almighty. He certainly could not do it in "Reflection on the World's Creation ...", ("Razmyshlenie o sozdanii mira…") partially paraphrasing the "Genesis" ("Kniga Bytija"). However, this poem is quite far from Christian orthodoxy in general and from the first chapter of the Genesis in particular. L. Zayonts believes that the poet replaces the God-Creator with the "God-Thinker" [11]. We believe that the 20-year-old "metaphysician" and "visionist" not only considers these two Divine modes as equals in the "first work of his muse", but also represents himself as a thinker-eclecticist. He equally understands and has insight into the antique and ancient Oriental mythologies, the Bible and the Apocrypha, ancient philosophy, modern natural science and mystical teachings. They all answer his question "how did creation occur?" Another question concerning Bobrov, unlike, for example, Radishchev and Shikhmatov, is "what preceded the creation?" or, in other words, "what is Chaos?" Let us cite the relevant fragments of "Reflection on the World's Creation ..." ("Razmyshlenie o sozdanii mira …") with a description of the motives contained, which do make up the pathos of eternity and transformation highly valued by Bobrov.
The soul of the poet flushed with rapture wants to penetrate into "an immemorial eternity", i.e. to see what preceded the creation and what is "incomprehensible to for man's reason": Open a secret door, you, pre-time pre-eternity! [2].
This detailed mythopoetic image of what existed "before time" and "before eternity" (Bobrov does not yet use the words nothing and Chaos) partly reminds the Old Testamentʼs Tehom (Chaos), about which it is said: "And the earth was waste and without form; and it was dark on the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God was moving on the face of the waters" (Gen. 1, 2). However, pre-Biblical, for example, ancient Egyptian, cosmogonic ideas about the original ocean are also conceived in it. This ocean is characterized by "nonexistence, absence of heaven, earth, created world" and there is "a creator" in it [5].
The God the Creator has a plot, a "drawing of material worlds", according to which He is going to create: Se obraz on sushhestv ne sozdannyh chertit, / I budushhee ih dvizhen'e umo-zrit! <…> [2].
Bobrov emphasizes that human language cannot depict such a "wonderful phenomenon" as "the creation created miraculously in eternity", and uses the most common biblical "formula of transformation" known from the non-canonical Old Testament's II Maccabees (124 B.C.): <...> suddenly, something was started from nothing... <...> [2].
However, he specifies later as involved in natural science issues of the century: However, something is not a dream, but a substance start. By the way, the substance as a creation material or result attractsattention of all metaphysical poets.
Dispute of powers -fire, water, earth and air-is resolved by the creating ghost that was "spilled" over them and flew over the water on the "vital wings". A kind of culmination of cosmogenesis "as per Bobrov" and one of the peaks of the transformation pathos in the poem is an orphic cosmogonic myth of the worldʼs egg [5]. The Creating Spirit that cannot always be associated with the Spirit of God in Bobrovʼs writings: Grel mira jaico, gde vse eshhe smesilos'; / Obrazoval rastok; -sogrel; -ono razkrylos'. / Ljubov' vtekaet v smes', i smes' priemlet chin; / Dyhan'e pervoe -hvala vine vseh vin, / Chto zhivotvornoju usmeshkoj ozhivljala, / I miru mudroe dvizhen'e darovala.
After the Spirit, the World Egg and the Love have given rise to life and motion in the world, the matter provided with creating capability enables a series of cosmogonic acts [11] which formally coincide with the third (creation of water, land, plants) and the fourth (the creation of heavenly bodies) days in the Hexaemeron. Nevertheless, the diagram proposed in the Bible does not always remain reputed for Bobrov. For example, he does not "count the days" and describes creation both as a one-stage process occurring here and now and as a discrete, stage-by-stage one.
The fifth "day of creation" as in the Hexaemeron turned out to be the most "problematic" for the poet. On this day, the God said, "Let the waters be full of living things, and let birds be in flight over the earth under the arch of heaven". And God made great sea-beasts, and every sort of living and moving thing with which the waters were full, and every sort of winged bird (Gen 1, 20-21). So, the worldʼs of Bobrov that claims for harmony simply lacks these creatures.
The process of creation ends in "Reflection on the Worldʼs Creation ..." ("Razmyshlenie o sozdanii mira…") with making "the beast of the earth after its sort, and the cattle after their sort beasts and reptiles" (Gen. 1, 24-25), and then the man by the earth itself but by the Creatorʼs "call" ("Let there be, the creating powerful voice said"). The remainder of the poem is a reminiscence of the second and third chapters of Genesis, a tale of the fall of the man and his Expulsion. Here, Bobrov manifests the idea of an "infinite chain of beings".

P. A. Slovtsov's "Matter"
This idea becomes one of the most important in the work of the fourth metaphysical poet, Slovtsov. In his poem with a programmatic and, most likely, polemical title "Matter" ("Materija"), a teacher at the Tobolsk seminary and part-time preacher almost completely ignores biblical cosmogony and creationism. As the author wanted to assure the reader, it was not metaphysics, but physics that interested him. He accompanied the name of the poem with a note: "The writer of this play wanted only to test whether physical truths can be offered in verse". Strictly speaking, deep and majestic poems about "physical truths" were created in Russian literature half a century ago. Moreover, if Slovtsov could not have known about the "Theoptia" ("Feoptija") by Trediakovsky, he could not fail to be aware of metaphysical and natural philosophical poetry by Lomonosov.
In the picture of cosmogenesis depicted by the poet of the late 18th century, the God does not participate in the process of creation, we only know that He <…> rests over the centers' center / and rotates worlds with a high hand [3]. The Creator is truly replaced by the matter, and Slovtsov is close here to Bobrovʼs opinion that the "substance", i.e. the matter [12] possesses a life-giving power and forms "three kingdoms of nature": inanimate nature (ores, minerals, etc.) -Flora -the animal world ("from worm to verbal livings").
This Chaos is physical: an empty and at the same time "dense" space. He is not created by anyone and therefore eternal. It has neither life, nor motion. Curiously, "build-up" of the space presupposes, according to Slovtsov, the presence of cosmic objects and air, and, hence, the center of the universe ("point") and primary elements (atoms) making up the matter.
While Slovtsov and Bobrov describe the image of Chaos in several verses, Radishchev has this important cosmogonic image. His historiosopheme is made up of individual characteristics, replicas given to different characters. This way of representation is the more so interesting because the fragment of the oratorio not completed by Radishchev, "Creation of the World", can be called a "prehistory" of the creation. The God and the Word are only going to create ("Well, shall we start?", "Letʼs start creating -what am I waiting for?" [1].). The work ends with the episode of "firmament" creation corresponding to the second day of the Hexaemeron. What do we learn about Chaos from Radishchevʼs "Panegyric Song" ("Pesnoslovie")?
Slovtsov does not deny (in the note to the poem) existence of a spiritual, supersensible world, but is inclined to believe that everything is material. He even bring into challenge the Christian dogma that God is the Spirit (Jn. 4, 24): Materija, vse massy obrazuja / I beskonechnu cep' sushhestv svjazuja, / Ob#emlet vsjo do zadnego kol'ca, / Ot gruboj glyby dazhe do tvorca [3].

Conclusion
By the end of the 18th century, the religious and philosophical mode of Russian poetry, which included spiritual and physico-theological verses, was enriched with "metaphysical" verses. The core of metaphysical poetry is cosmogonic and cosmological themes.
The most general diagram of the cosmogenic myth is as follows: "Someone has created something (one) somehow". Therefore, a researcher of poetic cosmogonies may seek answers to questions who appears as a subject of creation in the writing; what/whom exactly the creator builds up and in what sequence; why and how he does it.
As we can see, the pathoses of cosmogonic poems that were considered in the above paragraph are very different; they contain individual versions of the archetypal creation story.
These differences can be represented in the form of certain polarities, extreme points, located on the same axis -"from ... to ...": − from abiding faith in creation by the Word to the recognition of the self-organization of the material world and neglect of the spiritual world; − from praise of a man as to the Lord of the Nature to his fusion in a number of other beings.
Besides the substance as a creation material or result attractsattention of all metaphysical poets.
The matter vivifies the complete world and enjoys a creative power. This thesis generally does not contravene the Bible, but when being consistently applied, assumes some independence of the creation from the Creator. Slovtsov appeals to the Higher Power only when he faces the riddle of transition from "insignificance to being". Thus, we would designate the metaphysical pathos of the poem as of 1796 as one of deification of the matter creating the life.