All institutions, social and political, however disguised, were tyrannies, and must go.
In the newly awakened Russian mind, this first assumed the mild form of a demand for the removal of _legislative_ tyranny, by a system of gradual reforms.

This had failed--now the demand had become a mandate.
The people _must_ have relief.

The Tsar was the one person who could bestow it, and if he would not do so voluntarily, he must be compelled to grant it.

No one man had the right to wreck the happiness of millions of human beings.

If the authority was centralized, so was the responsibility.