 Book 5, Chapter 4 of the Brothers Karamazov. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Luk Kordas. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Translated by Konstantin Garnet. Book 5, Chapter 4, Rebellion. I must make one confession, even again. I could never understand how one can love one's neighbors. It's just one's neighbors, to my mind that one can't love, though one might love those at a distance. I once read somewhere of John the Merciful, a saint, that when a hungry frozen beggar came to him, he took him into his bed, held him in his arms, and began breathing into his mouth, which was putrid and loathsome for some awful disease. I am convinced that he did that from self-laceration, from the self-laceration of falsity for the sake of the charity imposed by duty, as a penance laid on him. For anyone to love a man, he must be hidden, as for soon as he shows his face, love is gone. Father Zosima has talked of that more than once, observed Alosha. He too said that the face of a man often hinders many people not practiced in love from loving him, but yet there is a great deal of love in mankind and almost Christ-like love. I know that myself, Ivan. Well, I know nothing of it so far, and I can understand it, and the innumerable mass of mankind are with me there. The question is, whether that's due to men's bad qualities, or whether it's inherent in their nature. To my thinking, Christ-like love for man is a miracle impossible on earth. He was God, but we are not gods. Suppose I, for instance, suffer intensely. Maner can never know how much I suffer because he is another and not I. And what's more, a man is rarely ready to admit another's suffering, as though it were a distinction. Why won't he admit it, do you think? Because I smell unpleasant, because I have a stupid face, because I once trod on his foot? Besides, there is suffering and suffering. Degrading, humiliating sufferers such as humbles me, hunger, for instance. My benefactor will perhaps allow me, but when you come to higher suffering, for an idea, for instance, he will very rarely admit that, perhaps because my face strikes him as not at all what he fancies a man should have who suffers for an idea. And so he deprives me instantly of his favor, and not at all from badness of heart. Beggars, especially genteel beggars, ought never to show themselves, but to ask for charity through the newspaper. One can love one's neighbors in the abstract, or even at a distance, but at close quarters it's almost impossible. If it were as on the stage, in the ballet, where if beggars come in they wear silken rags and tattered lace and beg for alms dancing gracefully, then one might like looking at them. But even then we should not love them. But enough of that. I simply wanted to show you my point of view. I meant to speak of the sufferings of mankind generally, but we had better confine ourselves to the sufferings of the children. That reduces the scope of my argument to a tenth of what it would be. Still, we'd better keep to the children, though it does weaken my case. But in the first place, children can be loved even at close quarters, even when they are dirty, even when they are ugly. I fancy though children never are ugly. The second reason why I won't speak of grown up people is that, besides being disgusting and unworthy of love, they have a compensation. They've eaten the apple and no good and evil, and they have become like gods. They go on eating it, still. But the children haven't eaten anything, and are so far innocent. Are you fond of children, Alosha? I know you are, and you will understand why I prefer to speak of them. If they too suffer horribly on earth, they must suffer for their fathers, since they must be punished for their fathers, who have eaten the apple. But that reasoning is of the other world and is incomprehensible for the heart of man here on earth. The innocent must not suffer for another since, and especially such innocence. You may be surprised at me, Alosha, but I am awfully fond of children too. And observe, cruel people, the violent, the rapacious, the karamazovs are sometimes very fond of children. Even while they are quite little, up to seven, for instance, they are so remote from grown-up people they are different creatures, as it were of a different species. I know a criminal in the prison who had, in the course of his career as a burglar, murdered whole families, including several children. But when he was in prison, he had a strange affection for them. He spent all his time at his window, watching the children playing in the prison yard. He trained one little boy to come up to his window and make great friends with him. You don't know why I'm telling you all this, Alosha. My head aches, and I am sad. You speak with a stranger, observed Alosha uneasily, as though you were not quite yourself. By the way, a Bulgarian I met lately in Moscow, Ivan went on, seeming not to hear his brother's words, told me about the crimes committed by Turks and Sarkasians in all parts of Bulgaria through fear of a general rising of the Slavs. They burn villages, murder, outrage women and children, they nail their prisoners by the ears to the fences, leave them so till morning and in the morning, they hang them. All sorts of things you can't imagine. People talk sometimes of beastial cruelty, but that's a great injustice and insult to the beasts. A beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically cruel. The tiger only turds and gnaws, that's all he can do. He would never think of nailing people by the ears, even if he were able to do it. These Turks took a pleasure in torturing children, too. Taking the unborn child from the mother's womb and tossing babies up in the air and catching them on the points of their bayonets before their mother's eyes. Doing it before the mother's eyes was what gave zest to the amusement. Here's another scene that I thought very interesting. Imagine a trembling mother with her baby on her arms, a circle of invading Turks around her. They've planned a diversion. They pet the baby, laugh to make it laugh. They succeed, the baby laughs. At that moment a Turk points a pistol, four inches from the baby's face. The baby laughs with glee, holds out its little hands to the pistol, and he pulls the trigger in the baby's face and blows out its brains. Like wasn't it? By the way, Turks are particularly fond of sweet things, they say. Brother, what are you driving at, asked Alosha. I think if the devil doesn't exist but man has created him, he has created him in his own image and likeness. Just as he did God then, observed Alosha. It's wonderful how you can turn words, as Polonius says in Hamlet, laughed even. You turned my words against me, well, I'm glad. Yours must be a fine God if man created him in his image and likeness. You asked me just now what I was driving at, you see, I am fond of collecting certain facts and, would you believe, I even copy some anecdotes of a certain sword from newspapers and books, and I have already got a fine collection. The Turks, of course, have gone into it too, but they are foreigners. I have specimen from home that are even better than the Turks. You know we prefer beating, rods, and scruges, that's our national institution. Nailing ears is unthinkable for us, for we are, after all, Europeans, but the rod and the scruge we have always with us and they cannot be taken from us. Abroad now they scarcely do any beating, manners are more humane, or laws have been passed so that they don't dare to flog man now, but they make it up for it in other way just as national as ours, and so national that it would be practically impossible among us, so I believe we are being inoculated with it since the religious movement began in our aristocracy. I have a charming pamphlet translated from the French, describing how quite recently, five years ago, a murderer, Richard, was executed. A young man, I believe of three and twenty, who repented and was converted to the Christian faith at the very scaffold. This Richard was a legitimate child who was given as a child of six by his parents to some shepherds on the Swiss mountain. They brought him up to work for them. He grew up like a little wild beast among them. The shepherds taught him nothing, and scarcely fed or clothed him, but sent him out at seven to herd flock and cold and wet, and no one hesitated or scrupled to treat him so. By the contrary, they thought they had every right for Richard had been given to them as a chattel, and they did not even see the necessity of feeding him. Richard himself describes how in those years, like the prodigal son in the Gospel, he longed to eat the mash given to the pigs, which were fattened for sale, but they wouldn't even give that, and beat him when he stole from the pigs. And that was how he spent all his childhood and his youth, till he grew up and was strong enough to go away and be a thief. The savage began to earn his living as a day laborer in Geneva. He drank what he earned, he lived like a brute, and finished by killing and robbing an old man. He was caught, tried, and condemned to death. They are not sentimentalists there. And in prison he was immediately surrounded by pastors, members of Christian brotherhoods, philanthropic ladies and the like. They taught him to read and write in prison, and expounded the Gospel to him. They exhorted him, worked upon him, drummed at him incessantly, till at last he solemnly confessed his crime. He was converted. He wrote to the court himself that he was a monster, but that in the end God had out-saved him light and shown grace. All Geneva was an excitement about him, all philanthropic and religious Geneva. All the aristocratic and well-bred society of town rushed to the prison, kissed Richard and embraced him. You are our brother, you have found grace, and Richard does nothing but weep with emotion. Yes, I have found grace. All my youth and childhood I was glad of pigs food, but now even I have found grace. I am dying in the Lord. Yes, Richard, die in the Lord. You have shed blood and must die, though it's not your fault that you knew not the Lord when you coveted the pigs food and were beamed for stealing it, which was very wrong of you for stealing is forbidden. But you have shed blood and must die. And on the last day, Richard, perfectly limp, did nothing but cry and repeat every minute, this is my happiest day, I am going to the Lord. Yes, are the pastors and the judges and philanthropic ladies, this is the happiest day of your life for you are going to the Lord. They all walk and drive to the scaffold in procession behind the prison van. Inside the scaffold, they call to Richard, die, brother, die in the Lord for even you have found grace. And so, covered with his brother's kisses, Richard is dragged onto the scaffold and led to the guillotine. And they chopped off his head in brotherly fashion because he had found grace. Yes, that's characteristic. That pamphlet is translated into Russian by some Russian philanthropist of aristocratic rank and evangelical aspirations and has been distributed gratis for the enlightenment of the people. The case of Richard is interesting because it's national. Though to us it's absurd to cut off a man's head because he has become our brother and has found grace, yet we have our own speciality, which is all but worse. Our historical pastime is the direct satisfaction of inflicting pain. There are lines in the cross of describing how a peasant lashed the horse on the eyes on its meek eyes everyone must have seen it. It's peculiarly Russian. He describes how a feeble little nag has foundered under a too heavy a load and cannot move. The peasant beats it, beats it savagely. Beats it at last not knowing what he is doing in the intoxication of cruelty, thrashes it mercilessly over and over again. However weak you are, you must pull, you'll die for it. The nag strains and then he begins lashing the poor, defenseless creature on its weeping, on its meek eyes. The frantic beast tugs and draws the load, trembling all over, gasping for breath, moving sideways with a sort of unnatural, spasmodic action. It's awful in the cross of. But that, only a horse. And God has horses to be beaten. So the taters have taught us and they left us the note as a remembrance of it. But man too can be beaten. A well educated, cultured gentleman and his wife beat their own child with a birch rod, a girl of seven. I have an exact account of it. The papa was glad that the birch was covered with twigs. It stings more, he said, and so he began stinging his daughter. I know for a fact there are people who at every blow are worked up to sensuality, to literal sensuality which increases progressively at every blow they inflict. They beat for a minute, for 5 minutes, for 10 minutes, more often than more savagely. The child screams. At last the child cannot scream, it gasps, daddy, daddy. By some diabolical, unseemly chants the case was brought into court. A council is engaged. The Russian people have long called a barrister a conscious for hire. The council protests in his client's defense. It's such a simple thing, he says, an everyday domestic event. A father corrects his child. To our shame be it said, it is brought into court. The jury, convinced by him, give a favourable verdict. The public roars with delight that the torture is acquitted. Pity I wasn't there. I would have proposed to raise a subscription in his honor, charming pictures. But I've still better things about children. I've collected a great, great deal about Russian children, Alosha. There was a little girl, 5, who was hated by her father and mother, most worthy and respectable people of good education and reading. You see, I must repeat again, it is a peculiar characteristic of many people. This love of torturing children and children only. To all other types of humanity these torturers behave mildly and benevolently, like cultivated and humane Europeans. But they are very fond of tormenting children, even fond of children themselves in that sense. It's just their defenselessness that tempts the tormentor, just the angelic confidence of the child who has no refuge and no appeal that sets his vile blood on fire. In every man, of course, a demon lies hidden. The demon of rage, the demon of lustful heat, at the screams of the tortured victim, the demon of lawlessness, lead of chain, the demon of diseases that follow on vice, gout, kidney, disease and so on. This poor child of 5 was subjected to every possible torture by those cultivated parents. They beat her, trashed her, kicked her for no reason till her body was one bruised. Then they went to greater refinements of cruelty, shut her up all night in the cold and frost in a privy and because she didn't ask to be taken up at night, as though a child of 5 sleeping its angelic sound sleep could be trained to wake and ask, they smeared her face and filled her mouth with excrement. And it was her mother, her mother did this. And that mother could sleep, hearing the poor child's groans. Can you understand why a little creature who can't even understand what's done to her should beat her little aching heart with her tiny fists in the dark and the cold and weep her meek unresentful tears to dear kind god to protect her? Do you understand that, friend and brother, you pious and humble novice, do you understand why this infamy must be and is permitted? Without it, I am told, man could not have existed on earth, for he could not have known good and evil. Why should he know that diabolical good and evil when it costs so much? Why the whole world of knowledge is not worth that child's prayer to dear kind god? I say nothing of the sufferings of grown up people, they have eaten the apple, damned them, and the devil take them all, but these little ones? I am making you suffer, Alosha, you are not yourself, I leave off if you like. Never mind, I want to suffer too. One picture, only one more, because it's so curious, so characteristic and I have only just read it in some collection of Russian antiquities. I forgot name, I must look it up. It was in the darkest days of Serfdom at the beginning of the century and long lived the liberator of the people. There was in those days a general of aristocratic connections, the owner of great estates. One of those men somewhat exceptional, I believe, even then, who, retiring from the service into a life of leisure, are convinced that they've earned absolute power over lives of their subjects. There were such men then, so our general, settled on his property of two thousand souls, lives in pomp and dominiers over his poor neighbors as though they were dependents and buffoons. He has canals of hundreds of hounds and nearly a hundred dog boys, all mounted and in uniform. One day a Serf boy, a little child of eight, threw a stone in plain and heard the paw of the general's favorite hound. Why is my favorite dog lame? He stalled at the boy through a stone that heard the dog's paw. So you did it. The general looked the child up and down. Take him. He was taken. Taken from his mother and kept shut up all night. Early that morning the general comes out on horseback with the hounds, his dependents, dog boys and huntsmen, all mountain round him in full hunting parade. The servants are summoned for their edification and in front of them all stands the mother of the child. The child is brought from the lookup. It's a gloomy, cold, foggy autumn day, a capital day for hunting. The general orders the child to be undressed. The child is stripped naked. He shivers, numbed with terror, not daring to cry. Make him run, commands the general. Run, run! Shout the dog boys. The boy runs. At him yells the general and he sets the whole pack of hounds on the child. The hounds catch him and tear him to pieces before his mother's eyes. I believe the general was afterwards declared incapable of administering his estates. Well, what did he deserve? To be shot? To be shot for the satisfaction of our moral feelings? Speak, Alosha. To be shot? murmured Alosha, lifting his eyes to even with a pale, twisted smile. Bravo! cried even delighted. If even you say so, you're a pretty mong. So there is a little devil sitting in your heart, Alosha Karamasov. What I said was absurd, but that's just a point, that but, cried even. Let me tell you, novice, that the absurd is only too necessary on earth. The world stands on absurdities, and perhaps nothing would have come to pass in it without them. We know what we know. What do you know? I understand nothing, even went on as though in delirium. I don't want to understand anything now, I want to stick to the fact. I made up my mind long ago not to understand. If I try to understand anything, I shall be false to the fact, and I have determined to stick to the fact. Why are you trying me, Alosha cried with sudden distress? Will you say what you mean at last? Of course I will. That's what I've been leading up to. You're dear to me, I don't want to let you go, and I won't give you up to your Zosima. Even for a minute was silent his face, became all at once very sad. Listen, I took the case of children only to make my case clearer. Of the other tears of humanity with which the earth is soaked from its crust to its center, I will say nothing. I have narrowed my subject on purpose, I am a bug, and I recognize in all humility that I cannot understand why the world is arranged as it is. Men are themselves to blame, I suppose. They were given paradise, they wanted freedom and stole fire from heaven, though they knew they would become unhappy, so there is no need to pity them. With my pitiful, earthly, euclidean understanding, all I know is that there is suffering and that there are non-guilty, that cause follows effect, simply and directly. That everything flows and finds its level. But that's only euclidean nonsense, I know that, and I can't consent to live by it. What comfort it is to me that there are non-guilty and that cause follows effect simply and directly, and that I know it, I must have justice, or I will destroy myself. And not justice in some remote, infinite time and space, but here, on earth, and that I could see myself, I have believed in it, I want to see it, and if I am dead by then, let me rise again, for if it all happens without me it will be too unfair. Surely I haven't suffered simply that I, my crimes and my sufferings, may manure the soil of the future harmony for somebody else. I want to see with my own eyes the hind lie down with the lion and the victim rise up and embrace his murderer. I want to be there when everybody suddenly understands what it has all been for. All the religions of the world are built on this longing, and I am a believer. But then there are the children, and what am I to do about them? That's a question I can't answer. For the hundredth time I repeat, there are numbers of questions, but I've only taken the children, because in their case, what I mean is so unanswerably clear. Listen, if all must suffer to pay for the eternal harmony, what have children to do with it? Tell me please. It's beyond all comprehension why they should suffer, and why they should pay for the harmony. Why should they to furnish material to enrich the soil for the harmony of the future? I understand solidarity in sin among men. I understand solidarity in retribution, too. But there can be no such solidarity with children. And if it is really true that they must share responsibility for all their father's crimes, such a truth is not of this world and is beyond my comprehension. Some jester will say perhaps that the child would have grown up and have sinned, but you see he didn't grow up. He was torn to pieces by the dogs at eight years old. Oh Alosha, I am not blaspheming. I understand, of course, what an upheaval of the universe it will be, when everything in heaven and earth blends in one hymn of praise, and everything that lives and has lived cries aloud, Thou art just, O Lord, for Thou ways are revealed. When the mother embraces the fiend who threw her child to the dogs, and all three cry aloud with tears, Thou art just, O Lord. Then of course, the crown of knowledge will be reached and all will be made clear. But what pulls me up here is that I can't accept that harmony, and while I'm on earth, I make haste to take my own measures. You see Alosha, perhaps it really may happen that if I live to that moment or rise again to see it, I too perhaps may cry it aloud with the rest, looking at the mother embracing child's torture. Thou art just, O Lord, but I don't want to cry aloud then. While there is still time, I hasten to protect myself and so I renounce the higher harmony altogether. It's not worth the tears of that one tortured child who beat itself on the breast with its little fist and prayed in its stinking outhouse with its unexpited tears to dear kind God. It's not worth it, because those tears are unattuned for. They must be attuned for, or there can be no harmony, but how? How are you going to attune for them? Is it possible? By their being avenged? But what do I care for avenging them? What do I care for a hell for oppressors? What good can hell do, since those children have already been tortured? And what becomes of harmony if there is hell? I want to forgive, I want to embrace, I don't want more suffering, and if the sufferings of children go to swell the sum of sufferings which was necessary to pay for truth, then I protest that the truth is not worth such a price. I don't want the mother to embrace the oppressor who threw her son to the dogs. She dare not forgive him. Let her forgive him for herself, if she will. Let her forgive the torturer for the immeasurable suffering of her mother's heart, but the sufferings of her tortured child she has no right to forgive. She dare not forgive the torturer, even if the child were to forgive him. And if that is so, if they dare not forgive, what becomes of harmony? Is there in the whole world a being who would have the right to forgive and could forgive? I don't want harmony. From love for humanity, I don't want it. I would rather be left with the unevented suffering. I would rather remain with my unevented suffering and unsatisfying indignation, even if I were wrong. Besides, too high a price is asked for harmony, it's beyond our means to pay so much to enter on it. And so I hasten to give back my entrance ticket, and if I am an honest man, I am bound to give it back as soon as possible. And that I am doing. It's not God that I don't accept Alosha, only I most respectfully return him the ticket. That's rebellion, murmured Alosha looking down. Rebellion? I am sorry you call it that, said even earnestly. One can hardly live in rebellion and I want to live. Tell me yourself, I challenge your answer. Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature, that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance, and to found that edifice on its unevented tears would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth. No, I wouldn't consent, said Alosha softly. And can you admit the idea that men for whom you are building it would agree to accept their happiness on the foundation of the unexplained blood of a little victim? And accepting it would remain happy forever? No, I can't admit it brother, said Alosha suddenly with flashing eyes. You said just now, is there a being in the whole world who would have the right to forgive and could forgive? But there is a being and he can forgive everything, all and for all, because he gave his innocent blood for all and everything. You have forgotten him, and on him is built the edifice, and it is to him they cry aloud, thou art just, O Lord, for thou ways are revealed. The one without sin and his blood. No, I have not forgotten him. On the contrary, I have been wondering all the time how it was you did not bring him in before. For usually all arguments on your side put him in the foreground. Do you know, Alosha? Don't laugh. I made a poem about a year ago. If you can waste another ten minutes on me, I'll tell it to you. You wrote a poem? Oh no, I didn't write it, laughed even, and I've never written two lines of poetry in my life, but I made up this poem in prose and I remembered it. I was carried away when I made it up. You will be my first reader, that is listener. Why shouldn't author forgo even one listener, smiled even? So I tell it to you? I am all attention, said Alosha. My poem is called The Grand Inquisitor. It's a ridiculous thing, but I want to tell it to you. End of chapter 4 of book 5, recording by Luke Cordes. Book 5, chapter 5 of the brothers Karamazov. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Bob Sherman. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky, translated by Constance Garnet. Book 5, chapter 5, The Grand Inquisitor. Even this must have a preface. That is a literary preface, laughed Yvonne, and I am a poor hand at making one. You see, my action takes place in the 16th century, and at that time, as you probably learned at school, it was customary in poetry to bring down heavenly powers on earth. Not to speak of Dante, in France, clerks as well as the monks in the monasteries, used to give regular performances in which the Madonna, the saints, the angels, Christ and God Himself were brought on the stage. In those days it was done in all simplicity. In Victor Hugo's Notre-Dame de Paris, an edifying and gratuitous spectacle was provided for the people in the Hotel de Ville of Paris in the reign of Louis XI, in honor of the birth of the Dauphin. It was called Le Bon-Jugement de la Très-Saint des Gracieuses Vierges-Maries, and she appears herself on the stage and pronounces her Bon-Jugement. Similar plays, chiefly from the Old Testament, were occasionally performed in Moscow, too, up to the times of Peter the Great. But besides plays, there were all sorts of legends and ballads scattered about the world, in which the saints and angels and all the powers of heaven took part when required. In our monasteries, the monks busied themselves in translating, copying, and even composing such poems, and even under the Tatars. There is, for instance, one such poem, of course from the Greek, The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell, with descriptions as bold as Dante's. Our Lady visits Hell, and the archangel Michael leads her through the torments. She sees the sinners in their punishment. There she sees, among others, one noteworthy set of sinners in a burning lake. Some of them sink to the bottom of the lake so that they can't swim out. And these God forgets. An expression of extraordinary depth and force. And so Our Lady, shocked and weeping, falls before the throne of God, and begs for mercy for all in Hell, for all she has seen there, indiscriminately. Her conversation with God is immensely interesting. She beseeches him. She will not desist. And when God points to the hands and feet of her son, nailed to the cross, and asks, how can I forgive his tormentors? She bids all the saints, all the martyrs, all the angels and archangels, to fall down with her and pray for mercy on all without distinction. It ends by her winning from God a respite of suffering every year from Good Friday till Trinity Day, and the sinners at once raise a cry of thankfulness from Hell, chanting, Thou art just, O Lord, in this judgment. Well my poem would have been of that kind if it had appeared at that time. He comes on the scene in my poem, but he says nothing, only appears and passes on. Fifteen centuries have passed since he promised to come in his glory, fifteen centuries since his prophet wrote, Behold, I come quickly. Of that day and that hour knoweth no man, neither the Son, but the Father, as he himself predicted on earth. That humanity awaits him with the same faith and with the same love, or with greater faith, for it is fifteen centuries since man has ceased to see signs from heaven. No signs from heaven come today to add to what the heart doth say. There was nothing left but faith in what the heart doth say. It is true there were many miracles in those days. There were saints who performed miraculous cures. Some holy people, according to their biographies, were visited by the Queen of Heaven herself. But the devil did not slumber, and doubts were already arising among men of the truth of these miracles. And just then there appeared in the north of Germany a terrible new heresy. A huge star, like to a torch, that is to a church, fell on the sources of the waters, and they became bitter. These heretics began blasphemously denying miracles. But those who remained faithful were all the more ardent in their faith. The tears of humanity rose up to him as before, awaited his coming, loved him, hoped for him, yearned to suffer and die for him as before. And for so many ages mankind had prayed with faith and fervour, O Lord our God hasten thy coming. For so many ages called upon him, that in his infinite mercy he deigned to come down to his servants. Before that day he had come down. He had visited some holy men, martyrs and hermits, as is written in their lives. Among us, Tchuchev, with absolute faith in the truth of his words, bore witness that bearing the cross in slavish dress, weary and worn, the heavenly king, our mother Russia came to bless, and through our land went wandering. And that certainly was so, I assure you. And behold, he deigned to appear for a moment to the people, to the tortured, suffering people, sunk in iniquity, but loving him like children. My story is laid in Spain, in Seville, in the most terrible time of the Inquisition, the fires were lighted every day to the glory of God, and in the splendid auto-defe, the wicked heretics were burnt. Oh, of course, this was not the coming in which he will appear according to his promise, at the end of time, in all his heavenly glory, and which will be sudden as lightning flashing from east to west. No, he visited his children only for a moment, and there where the flames were crackling round the heretics. In his infinite mercy he came once more among men in that human shape in which he walked among men for thirty-three years, fifteen centuries ago. He came down to the hot pavements of the southern town, in which on the day before almost a hundred heretics had, ad mayorem gloriam dei, been burnt by the cardinal, the grand inquisitor, in a magnificent auto-defe, in the presence of the king, the court, the knights, the cardinals, the most charming ladies of the court, and the whole population of Seville. He came softly, unobserved, and yet strange to say, everyone recognized him. That might be one of the best passages in the poem, I mean why they recognized him. The people are irresistibly drawn to him, they surround him, they flock about him, follow him. He moves silently in their midst with a gentle smile of infinite compassion. The sun of love burns in his heart, light and power shine from his eyes, and their radiance shed on the people stirs their hearts with responsive love. He holds out his hands to them, blesses them, and a healing virtue comes from contact with him, even with his garments. An old man in the crowd, blind from childhood, cries out, O Lord, heal me, and I shall see thee. And as it were, scales fall from his eyes, and the blind man sees him. The crowd weeps and kisses the earth under his feet. Children throw flowers before him, sing and cry Hosanna. It is he, it is he, all repeat, it must be he, it can be no one but him. He stops at the steps of the Seville Cathedral at the moment when the weeping mourners are bringing in a little open white coffin. In it lies a child of seven, the only daughter of a prominent citizen. The dead child lies hidden in flowers. He will raise your child, the crowd shouts to the weeping mother. The priest, coming to meet the coffin, looks perplexed and frowns. But the mother of the dead child throws herself at his feet with a wail. If it is thou, raise my child, she cries, holding out her hands to him. The procession halts, the coffin is laid on the steps at his feet. He looks with compassion, and his lips once more softly pronounce. Maiden arise, and the maiden arises. The little girl sits up in the coffin and looks round, smiling with wide open, wandering eyes, holding a bunch of white roses they had put in her hand. There are cries, sobs, confusion among the people. And at that moment, the cardinal himself, the grand inquisitor, passes by the cathedral. He is an old man, almost ninety, tall and erect with a withered face and sunken eyes in which there is still a gleam of light. He is not dressed in his gorgeous cardinal's robes as he was the day before, when he was burning the enemies of the Roman church. At this moment he is wearing his coarse old monk's cassock. At a distance behind him come his gloomy assistants and slaves and the holy guard. He stops at the sight of the crowd and watches it from a distance. He sees everything. He sees them set the coffin down at his feet, sees the child rise up and his face darkens. He knits his thick gray brows and his eyes gleam with a sinister fire. He holds out his finger and bids the guards take him. And such is his power, so completely are the people cowed in submission and trembling obedience to him that the crowd immediately makes way for the guards. And in the midst of deathlike silence they lay hands on him and lead him away. The crowd instantly bows down to the earth like one man before the old inquisitor. He blesses the people in silence and passes on. The guards lead their prisoner to the close gloomy vaulted prison in the ancient palace of the holy inquisition and shut him in it. The day passes and is followed by the dark, burning, breathless night of Seville. The air is fragrant with laurel and lemon. In the pitch darkness the iron door of the prison is suddenly opened and the grand inquisitor himself comes in with a light in his hand. He is alone. The door is closed at once behind him. He stands in the doorway and for a minute or two gazes into his face. At last he goes up slowly, sets the light on the table and speaks. Is it thou? Thou? But receiving no answer he adds at once. Don't answer! Be silent! What canst thou say, indeed? I know too well what thou wouldst say, and thou hast no right to add anything to what thou hast said of old. Why then art thou come to hinder us? For thou hast come to hinder us, and thou knowest that. But dost thou know what will be tomorrow? I know not who thou art, and care not to know whether it is thou, or only a semblance of him. But tomorrow I shall condemn thee and burn thee at the stake as the worst of heretics. And the very people who have today kissed thy feet, tomorrow at the faintest sign from me will rush to heap up the embers of thy fire. Knowest thou that? Yes, maybe thou knowest it, he added with thoughtful penetration, never for a moment taking his eyes off the prisoner. I don't quite understand, Yvonne. What does it mean? Alyosha, who had been listening in silence, said with a smile. Is it simply a wild fantasy, or a mistake on the part of the old man? Some impossible quid pro quo? Take it as the last, said Yvonne, laughing, if you are so corrupted by modern realism and can't stand anything fantastic, if you like it to be a case of mistaken identity, let it be so. It is true, he went on laughing, the old man was ninety, and he might well be crazy over his set idea. He might have been struck by the appearance of the prisoner. It might in fact be simply his ravings, the delusion of an old man of ninety, overexcited by the auto-defei of a hundred heretics the day before. But does it matter to us, after all, whether it was a mistake of identity or a wild fantasy? All that matters is that the old man should speak out, that he should speak openly of what he has thought in silence for ninety years. And the prisoner, too, is silent? Does he look at him and not say a word? It's inevitable in any case, Yvonne laughed again. The old man has told him he hasn't the right to add anything to what he has said of old. One may say it is the most fundamental feature of Roman Catholicism, in my opinion at least. All has been given by thee to the pope, they say, and all, therefore, is still in the pope's hands, and there is no need for thee to come now at all. Thou must not meddle, for the time at least. That's how they speak and write, too, the Jesuits at any rate. I've read it myself in the works of their theologians. Hast thou the right to reveal to us one of the mysteries of that world from which thou hast come? My old man asks him and answers the question for him. No, thou hast not. That thou mayest not add to what has been said of old, and mayest not take from men the freedom which thou didst exalt when thou wasst on earth. Not so ever thou revealest anew will encroach on men's freedom of faith, for it will be manifest as a miracle, and the freedom of their faith was dearer to thee than anything in those days fifteen hundred years ago. Didst thou not often say, then, I will make you free? But now thou hast seen these free men, the old man adds suddenly with a pensive smile. Yes, we've paid dearly for it, he goes on looking sternly at him. But at last we have completed that work in thy name. For fifteen centuries we have been wrestling with thy freedom. But now it is ended and over for good. Does thou not believe that it's over for good? Thou lookest meekly at me, and dainest not even to be wroth with me. But let me tell thee that now, today, people are more persuaded than ever that they have perfect freedom, yet they have brought their freedom to us and laid it humbly at our feet. But that has been our doing. Was this what thou didst? Was this thy freedom? I don't understand again, Al-Yoshua broke in. Is he ironical? Is he jesting? Not a bit of it. He claims that it is a merit for himself and his church that at last they have vanquished freedom and have done so to make men happy. For now, he is speaking of the Inquisition, of course, for the first time it has become possible to think of the happiness of men. Man was created a rebel, and how can rebels be happy? Thou wasst warned, he says to him, thou hast had no lack of admonitions and warnings, but thou didst not listen to those warnings. Thou didst reject the only way by which men might be made happy. But fortunately departing, thou didst hand on the work to us. Thou hast promised, thou hast established by thy word, thou hast given to us the right to bind and to unbind, and now, of course, thou canst not think of taking it away. Why then hast thou come to hinder us? And what's the meaning of no lack of admonitions and warnings, asked Al-Yoshua? Why that's the chief part of what the old man must say. The wise and dread spirit, the spirit of self-destruction and non-existence, the old man goes on, the great spirit, talked with thee in the wilderness, and we are told in the books that he tempted thee. Is that so? And could anything trueer be said than what he revealed to thee in three questions, and what thou didst reject, and what in the books is called the temptation? And yet, if there has ever been on earth a real stupendous miracle, it took place on that day, on the day of the three temptations. The statement of those three questions was itself the miracle. If it were possible to imagine, simply for the sake of argument that those three questions of the dread spirit had perished utterly from the books, and that we had to restore them and to invent them anew, and to do so had gathered together all the wise men of the earth, rulers, chief priests, learned men, philosophers, poets, and had set them the task to invent three questions such as would not only fit the occasion, but express in three words three human phrases, the whole future history of the world and of humanity. Dost thou believe that all the wisdom of the earth united could have invented anything in depth and force equal to the three questions which were actually put to thee then by the wise and mighty spirit in the wilderness? From those questions alone, from the miracle of their statement, we can see that we have here to do not with a fleeting human intelligence, but with the absolute and eternal, for in those three questions, the whole subsequent history of mankind is, as it were, brought together into one whole and foretold, and in them are united all the unsolved historical contradictions of human nature. At the time it could not be so clear, since the future was unknown, but now that 1500 years have passed, we see that everything in those three questions was so justly divine and foretold, and has been so truly fulfilled that nothing can be added to them or taken from them. Judge thyself who was right. Thou or he who questioned thee then. Remember the first question. Its meaning, in other words, was this. Thou wouldst go into the world and art going with empty hands, with some promise of freedom which men in their simplicity and their natural unrulyness cannot even understand, which they fear and dread, for nothing has ever been more insupportable for a man and a human society than freedom. But seeest thou these stones in this parched and barren wilderness? Turn them into bread, and mankind will run after thee like a flock of sheep, grateful and obedient, though forever trembling lest thou withdraw thy hand and deny them thy bread. But thou wouldst not deprive man of freedom, and wouldst reject the offer, thinking, what is that freedom worth if obedience is bought with bread? Thou didst reply that man lives not by bread alone. But dost thou know that for the sake of that earthly bread, the spirit of the earth will rise up against thee and will strive with thee and overcome thee, and all will follow him crying, who can compare with this beast he has given us fire from heaven? But dost thou know that the ages will pass and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime and therefore no sin, there is only hunger? Feed men, and then ask of them virtue. That's what they'll write on the banner which they will raise against thee, and with which they will destroy thy temple, where thy temple stood will rise a new building, the terrible tower of Babel will be built again, and though like the one of old it will not be finished, yet thou mightst have prevented that new tower, and have cut short the sufferings of men for a thousand years, for they will come back to us after a thousand years of agony with their tower. They will seek us again, hidden underground in the catacombs, for we shall again be persecuted and tortured. They will find us and cry to us, feed us, for those who have promised us fire from heaven haven't given it. And then we shall finish building their tower, for he finishes the building who feeds them, and we alone shall feed them in thy name, declaring falsely that it is in thy name. Oh, never, never can they feed themselves without us. No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, make us your slaves, but feed us. They will understand themselves, at last, that freedom and bread enough for all are inconceivable together, for never, never will they be able to share between them. They will be convinced, too, that they can never be free, for they are weak, vicious, worthless, and rebellious. Thou didst promise them the bread of heaven, but I repeat again, can it compare with earthly bread in the eyes of the weak, ever-sinfel and ignoble race of man? And if for the sake of the bread of heaven thousands shall follow thee, what is to become of the millions and tens of thousands of millions of creatures who will not have the strength to forego the earthly bread for the sake of the heavenly? Or dost thou care only for the tens of thousands of the great and strong, while the millions numerous as the sands of the sea who are weak but love thee must exist only for the sake of the great and strong? No, we care for the weak, too. They are sinful and rebellious, but in the end they, too, will become obedient. They will marvel at us and look on us as gods, because we are ready to endure the freedom which they have found so dreadful and to rule over them. So awful it will seem to them to be free. But we shall tell them that we are thy servants and rule them in thy name. We shall deceive them again, for we will not let thee come to us again. That deception will be our suffering, for we shall be forced to lie. This is the significance of the first question in the wilderness, and this is what thou hast rejected for the sake of that freedom which thou hast exalted above everything. Yet in this question lies hid the great secret of this world. Choosing bread, thou wouldst have satisfied the universal and everlasting craving of humanity to find someone to worship. So long as man remains free, he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find someone to worship. But man seeks to worship what is established beyond dispute, so that all men would agree at once to worship it. For these pitiful creatures are concerned not only to find what one or the other can worship, what is essential is that all may be together in it. This craving for community of worship is the chief misery of every man individually and of all humanity from the beginning of time. For the sake of common worship, they've slain each other with the sword. They have set up gods and challenged one another, put away your gods and come and worship ours, or we will kill you and your gods. And so it will be to the end of the world. Even when gods disappear from the earth, they will fall down before idols just the same. Thou didst know, thou couldst not but have known this fundamental secret of human nature. But thou didst reject the one infallible banner which was offered thee to make all men bow down to thee alone. The banner of earthly bread. And thou hast rejected it for the sake of freedom and the bread of heaven. Behold what thou didst further, and all again in the name of freedom. I tell thee that man is tormented by no greater anxiety than to find someone quickly to whom he can hand over that gift of freedom with which the ill-fated creature is born. But only one who can appease their conscience can take over their freedom. In bread there was offered thee an invincible banner. Give bread, and man will worship thee, for nothing is more certain than bread. But if someone else gains possession of his conscience, oh, then he will cast away thy bread, and follow after him who has ensnared his conscience. In that thou wast right, for the secret of man's being is not only to live, but to have something to live for. Without a stable conception of the object of life, man would not consent to go on living, and would rather destroy himself than remain on earth, though he had bread in abundance. That is true. But what happened? Instead of taking men's freedom from them, thou didst make it greater than ever. Didst thou forget that man prefers peace, and even death, to freedom of choice in the knowledge of good and evil? Nothing is more seductive for man than his freedom of conscience, but nothing is a greater cause of suffering. And behold, instead of giving a firm foundation for setting the conscience of man at rest for ever, thou didst choose all that is exceptional, vague, and enigmatic. Thou didst choose what was utterly beyond the strength of men, acting as though thou didst not love them at all. Thou who didst come to give thy life for them. Instead of taking possession of men's freedom, thou didst increase it, and burdened the spiritual kingdom of mankind with its sufferings for ever. Thou didst desire man's free love, that he should follow thee freely, enticed, and taken captive by thee. In place of the rigid ancient law, man must hereafter, with free heart, decide for himself what is good and what is evil, having only thy image before him as his guide. But didst thou not know that he would at last reject even thy image and thy truth, if he is weighed down with a fearful burden of free choice? They will cry aloud at last that the truth is not in thee, for they could not have been left in greater confusion and suffering than thou has caused, laying upon them so many cares and unanswerable problems. So that in truth, thou didst thyself lay the foundation for the destruction of thy kingdom, and no one is more to blame for it. Yet what was offered thee? There are three powers, three powers alone, able to conquer and to hold captive forever, the conscience of these impotent rebels for their happiness. Those forces are miracle, mystery, and authority. Thou hast rejected all three, and hast set the example for doing so. When the wise and dread spirit set thee on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to thee, if thou wouldst know whether thou art the son of God, then cast thyself down, for it is written, the angels shall hold him up, lest he fall and bruise himself, and thou shalt know then whether thou art the son of God, and shalt prove then how great is thy faith and thy father. But thou didst refuse and would not cast thyself down. Oh, of course, thou didst proudly and well, like God. But the weak, unruly race of men, are they gods. Oh, thou didst know then that in taking one step, in making one movement to cast thyself down, thou wouldst be tempting God and have lost all thy faith in him, and wouldst have been dashed to pieces against that earth which thou didst come to save. And the wise spirit that tempted thee would have rejoiced. But I ask again, are there many like thee, and couldst thou believe for one moment that men too could face such a temptation? Is the nature of men such that they can reject miracle, and at the great moments of their life, the moments of their deepest, most agonizing spiritual difficulties, cling only to the free verdict of the heart? Oh, thou didst know that thy deed would be recorded in books, would be handed down to remote times, and the utmost ends of the earth. And thou didst hope that man following thee would cling to God and not ask for a miracle. But thou didst not know that when man rejects miracle, he rejects God too. For man seeks not so much God as the miraculous, and as man cannot bear to be without the miraculous, he will create new miracles of his own for himself, and will worship deeds of sorcery and witchcraft, though he might be a hundred times over, a rebel, heretic, an infidel. Thou didst not come down from the cross when they shouted to thee, mocking and reviling thee, come down from the cross, and we will believe that thou art he. Thou didst not come down for again, thou didst not enslave man by a miracle, and didst crave faith given freely, not based on miracle. Thou didst crave for free love, and not the base raptures of the slave before the might that has overawed him forever. But thou didst think too highly of men therein, for they are slaves, of course, the rebellious by nature. Look round and judge, 15 centuries have passed, look upon them. Whom hast thou raised up to thyself? I swear man is weaker and baser by nature than thou hast believed him. Can he, can he do what thou didst? By showing him so much respect, thou didst as it were cease to feel for him, for thou didst ask far too much from him, thou who hast loved him more than thyself. Respecting him less, thou wouldst have asked less of him. That would have been more light love, for his burden would have been lighter. He is weak and vile. What though he is everywhere now, rebelling against our power and proud of his rebellion, it is the pride of a child and a schoolboy, their little children rioting and barring out the teacher at school. But their childish delight will end. It will cost them dear. They will cast down temples and drench the earth with their blood. But they will see at last the foolish children, that though they are rebels, they are impotent rebels, unable to keep up their own rebellion. Baved in their foolish tears, they will recognize at last that he who created them rebels must have meant to mock at them. They will say this in despair, and their utterance will be a blasphemy which will make them more unhappy still, for man's nature cannot bear blasphemy, and in the end always avenges it on itself. And so, unrest, confusion, and unhappiness, that is the present lot of man after thou didst bear so much for his freedom. The great prophet tells in vision and in image that he saw all those who took part in the first resurrection, and that there were of each tribe 12,000. But if there were so many of them, they must have been not men but gods. They had borne thy cross, they had endured scores of years in the barren, hungry wilderness, living upon locusts and roots. And thou mayest indeed point with pride at those children of freedom, of free love, of free and splendid sacrifice for thy name. But remember that they were only some thousands. And what of the rest? And how are the other weak ones to blame because they could not endure what the strong have endured? How is a weak soul to blame that it is unable to receive such terrible gifts? Canst thou have simply come to the elect and for the elect? If so, it is a mystery and we cannot understand it. And if it is a mystery, we too have a right to preach a mystery and to teach men that it's not the free judgment of their hearts, not love that matters, but a mystery which they must follow blindly, even against their conscience. So we have done. We have corrected thy work and have founded it upon miracle, mystery and authority. And men rejoiced that they were again led like sheep and that the terrible gift that had brought them such suffering was at last lifted from their hearts. Were we right teaching them this? Speak, did we not love mankind so meekly acknowledging their feebleness, lovingly lightening their burden and permitting their weak nature even seen with our sanction? Why hast thou come now to hinder us? And why does thou look silently and searchingly at me with thy mild eyes? Be angry, I don't want thy love, for I love thee not. And what use is it for me to hide anything from thee? Don't I know to whom I am speaking? All that I can say is known to thee already. And is it for me to conceal from thee our mystery? Perhaps it is thy will to hear it from my lips. Listen then, we are not working with thee, but with him. That is our mystery. It's long, eight centuries since we have been on his side and not on thine. Just eight centuries ago we took from him the wise and mighty spirit and the wilderness what thou didst reject with scorn, the last gift he offered thee, showing thee all the kingdoms of the earth. We took from him Rome and the sword of Caesar and proclaimed ourselves sole rulers of the earth, though we have not yet been able to complete our work. But whose fault is that? Oh, the work is only beginning, but it has begun. It has longed to await completion and the earth has yet much to suffer. But we shall triumph and shall be Caesars and then we shall plan the universal happiness of man. But thou mightst have taken even then the sword of Caesar. Why didst thou reject that last gift? Had thou accepted that last offer of the mighty spirit, thou wouldst have accomplished all that man seeks on earth. That is, someone to worship, someone to keep his conscience and some means of uniting all in one unanimous and harmonious and heap. Because the craving for universal unity is the third and last anguish of men. Mankind as a whole has always striven to organize a universal state. There have been many great nations with great histories but the more highly they were developed the more unhappy they were. For they felt more acutely than other people the craving for worldwide union. The great conquerors, Timores and Genghis Khan's whirled like hurricanes over the face of the earth striving to subdue its people and they too were but the unconscious expression of the same craving for universal unity. Hadst thou taken the world and Caesar's purple, thou wouldst have founded the universal state and have given universal peace. For who can rule men if not he who holds their conscience and their bread in his hands? We have taken the sword of Caesar and in taking it of course have rejected thee and followed him. Oh, ages are yet to come of the confusion of free thought, of their science and cannibalism. For having begun to build their tower of Babel without us they will end of course with cannibalism. But then the beast will crawl to us and lick our feet and spatter them with tears of blood and we shall sit upon the beast and raise the cup and on it will be written mystery. But then and only then the reign of peace and happiness will come for men. Thou art proud of thine elect but thou hast only the elect while we give rest to all. And besides how many of those elect, those mighty ones who could become elect have grown weary waiting for thee and have transferred and will transfer the powers of their spirit and the warmth of their heart to the other camp and end by raising their free banner against thee. Doubts, thy self lift up that banner. But with us all will be happy and will no more rebel nor destroy one another as under thy freedom. No, we shall persuade them that they will only become free when they renounce their freedom to us and submit to us. And shall we be right or shall we be lying? They will be convinced that we are right for they will remember the horrors of slavery and confusion to which thy freedom brought them. Freedom, free thought and science will lead them into such straits and will bring them face to face with such marvels and insoluble mysteries that some of them, the fierce and rebellious, will destroy themselves. Others, rebellious but weak, will destroy one another while the rest, weak and unhappy, will crawl fawning to our feet and whine to us, yes, you are right, you alone possess his mystery and we come back to you, save us from ourselves. Receiving bread from us they will see clearly that we take the bread made by their hands from them to give it to them without any miracle. They will see that we do not change the stones to bread but in truth they will be more thankful for taking it from our hands than for the bread itself for they will remember only too well that in old days without our help even the bread they made turned to stones in their hands while since they have come back to us the very stones have turned to bread in their hands. Too, too well will they know the value of complete submission and until men know that they will be unhappy. Who is most to blame for their not knowing it? Speak, who scattered the flock and sent it astray on unknown paths? But the flock will come together again and will submit once more and then it will be once for all. Then we shall give them the quiet, humble happiness of weak creatures such as they are by nature. Oh, we shall persuade them at last not to be proud for thou didst lift them up and thereby taught them to be proud. We shall show them that they are weak, that they are only pitiful children but the childlike happiness is the sweetest of all. They will become timid and will look to us and huddle close to us in fear as chicks to the hen. They will marvel at us and will be all stricken before us and will be proud at our being so powerful and clever that we have been able to subdue such a turbulent flock of thousands of millions. They will tremble impotently before our wrath. Their minds will grow fearful. They will be quick to shed tears like women and children but they will be just as ready at a sign from us to pass to laughter and rejoicing to happy mirth and childish song. Yes, we shall set them to work but in their leisure hours we shall make their life like a child's game with children's songs and innocent dance. Oh, we shall allow them even sin. They are weak and helpless and they will love us like children because we allow them to sin. We shall tell them that every sin will be expiated if it is done with our permission that we allow them to sin because we love them and the punishment for these sins we take upon ourselves and we shall take it upon ourselves and they will adore us as their saviours who have taken on themselves their sins before God and they will have no secrets from us. We shall allow or forbid them to live with their wives and mistresses to have or not to have children according to whether they have been obedient or disobedient and they will submit to us gladly and cheerfully the most painful secrets of their conscience all, all they will bring to us and we shall have an answer for all and they will be glad to believe our answer for it will save them from the great anxiety and terrible agony they endure at present in making a free decision for themselves and all will be happy all the millions of creatures except the hundred thousand who rule over them for only we, we who guard the mystery shall be unhappy there will be thousands of millions of happy babes and hundred thousand sufferers who have taken upon themselves the curse of the knowledge of good and evil peacefully they will die peacefully they will expire in thy name and beyond the grave they will find nothing but death but we shall keep the secret and for their happiness we shall allure them with the reward of heaven and eternity though if there were anything in the other world it certainly would not be for such as they it is prophesied that thou wilt come again in victory thou wilt come with thy chosen, the proud and the strong but we will say that they have only saved themselves but we have saved all we are told that the harlot who sits upon the beast and holds in her hands the mystery shall be put to shame that the weak will rise up again and will rend her royal purple and will strip naked her loathsome body but then I will stand up and point out to thee the thousand millions of happy children who have no no sin and we who have taken their sins upon us for their happiness will stand up before thee and say judge us if thou canst and darest know that I fear thee not know that I too have been in the wilderness I too have lived on roots and locusts I too prize the freedom with which thou hast blessed men and I too was striving to stand among thy elect among the strong and powerful thirsting to make up the number but I awakened and would not serve madness I turned back and joined the ranks of those who have corrected thy work I left the proud and went back to the humble for the happiness of the humble what I say to thee will come to pass and our dominion will be built up I repeat tomorrow thou shalt see that obedient flock who had a sign from me will hasten to heap up the hot cinders about the pile on which I shall burn thee for coming to hinder us for if anyone has ever deserved our fires it is thou tomorrow I shall burn thee Dixie Ivan stopped he was carried away as he talked and spoke with excitement when he had finished he suddenly smiled Alyosha had listened in silence towards the end he was greatly moved and seemed several times on the point of interrupting but restrained himself now his words came with a rush but that's absurd he cried flushing your poem is in praise of Jesus not in blame of him as you meant it to be and who will believe you about freedom is that the way to understand it that's not the idea of it in the orthodox church that's Rome and not even the whole of Rome it's false those are the worst of the Catholics the inquisitors the Jesuits and there could not be such a fantastic creature as your inquisitor what are these sins of mankind they take on themselves who are these keepers of the mystery who've taken some curse upon themselves for the happiness of mankind when have they been seen we know the Jesuits they're spoken ill of but surely they're not what you describe they're not that at all not at all they're simply the Romish army for the earthly sovereignty of the world in the future with the pontiff of Rome for emperor that's their ideal but there's no sort of mystery or lofty melancholy about it it's simple lust of power a filthy earthly gain of domination something like a universal serfdom with them as masters that's all they stand for they don't even believe in God perhaps your suffering inquisitor is a mere fantasy stay, stay laughed Yvonne how hot you are a fantasy you say let it be so of course it's a fantasy but allow me to say do you really think that the Roman Catholic movement of the last centuries is actually nothing but the lust of power of filthy earthly gain is that Father Pesci's teaching no no on the contrary Father Pesci did once say something rather the same as you but of course it's not the same not a bit the same Alyosha hastily corrected himself a precious admission in spite of your not a bit the same I ask you why your Jesuits and inquisitors have united simply for vile material gain why can there not be among them one martyr oppressed by great sorrow and loving humanity you see only suppose that there was one such man among all those who desire nothing but filthy material gain if there's only one like my old inquisitor who had himself eaten roots in the desert and made frenzied efforts to subdue his flesh to make himself free and perfect but yet all his life he loved humanity and suddenly his eyes were opened and he saw that it is no great moral blessedness to attain perfection and freedom if at the same time one gains the conviction that millions of God's creatures have been created as a mockery that they will never be capable of using their freedom that these poor rebels can never turn into giants to complete the tower that it was not for such geese that the great idealist dreamt his dream of harmony seeing all that he turned back and joined the clever people surely that could have happened joined whom? what clever people cried Alyosha completely carried away they had no such great cleverness and no mysteries and secrets perhaps nothing but atheism that's all their secret your inquisitor does not believe in God that's his secret what if it is so? at last you've guessed it it's perfectly true it's true that that's the whole secret but isn't that suffering at least for a man like that who has wasted his whole life in the desert and yet could not shake off his incurable love of humanity in his old age he reached the clear conviction that nothing but the advice of the great dread spirit could build up any tolerable sort of life for the feeble unruly incomplete empirical creatures created in jest and so convinced of this he sees that he must follow the counsel of the wise spirit the dread spirit of death and destruction and therefore accept lying and deception and lead men consciously to death and destruction and yet deceive them all the way so that they may not notice where they're being led that the poor blind creatures may at least on the way think themselves happy and note the deception is in the name of him in whose ideal the old man had so fervently believed all his life long is not that tragic and if only one such stood at the head of the whole army filled with the lust of power only for the sake of filthy gain would not one such be enough to make a tragedy more than that one such standing at the head is enough to create the actual leading idea of the roman church with all its armies and Jesuits its highest idea i tell you frankly that i firmly believe that there is always been such a man among those who stood at the head of the movement who knows there may have been some such even among the roman popes who knows perhaps the spirit of that accursed old man who loves mankind so obstinately in his own way is to be found even now in a whole multitude of such old men existing not by chance but by agreement as a secret league formed long ago for the guarding of the mystery to guard it from the weak and the unhappy so as to make them happy no doubt it is so and so it must be indeed i fancy that even among the masons there's something of the same mystery at the bottom and that that's why the catholics so detest the masons as their rivals breaking up the unity of the idea while it is so essential that there should be one flock and one shepherd but from the way i defend my idea i might be an author impatient of your criticism enough of it you are perhaps a mason yourself broke suddenly from al-yoshua you don't believe in god he added speaking this time very sorrowfully he fancied besides that his brother was looking at him ironically how does your poem and he asked suddenly looking down or was at the end i meant to end like this when the inquisitor ceased speaking he waited some time for his prisoner to answer him his silence weighed down upon him he saw that the prisoner had listened intently all the time looking gently in his face evidently not wishing to reply the old man longed for him to say something however bitter and terrible but he suddenly approached the old man in silence and softly kissed him on his bloodless aged lips that was all his answer the old man shuddered his lips moved he went to the door opened it and said to him go and come no more come not at all never never and he let him out into the dark alleys of the town the prisoner went away and the old man the kiss glows in his heart but the old man adheres to his idea and you with him you too cried al-yoshua mournfully yvonne laughed why it's all nonsense al-yoshua it's only a senseless poem of a senseless student who could never write two lines of verse why do you take it so seriously surely you don't suppose I'm going straight off to the Jesuits to join the men who are correcting his work good lord it's no business of mine I told you all I want is to live on to thirty and then dash the cup to the ground but the sticky little leaves and the precious tombs and the blue sky and the woman you love how will you live how will you love them al-yoshua cried sorrowfully with such a hell in your heart in your head how can you no that's just what you were going away for to join them if not you will kill yourself you can't endure it there is a strength to endure everything yvonne said with a cold smile the strength of the karamazovs the strength of the karamazov baseness to sink into debauchery to stifle your soul with corruption yes possibly even that only perhaps till I'm thirty I shall escape it and then how will you escape it by what will you escape it that's impossible with your ideas and the karamazov way again everything is lawful you mean everything is lawful is that it yvonne scowled and all at once turned strangely pale uh... you've caught up yesterday's phrase which so offended mousse off and which dmitri pounced upon so naively paraphrased he smiled clearly yes if you like everything is lawful since the word has been said I won't deny it and mitches version isn't bad al-yoshua looked at him in silence I thought that going away from here I would have you at least yvonne said suddenly with unexpected feeling but now I see that there is no place for me even in your heart my dear hermit the formula all is lawful I won't renounce will you renounce me for that yes al-yoshua got up went to him and softly kissed him on the lips that's plagiarism cried yvonne highly delighted you stole that from my poem thank you though get up al-yoshua it's time we were going both of us they went out but stopped when they reached the entrance of the restaurant listen al-yoshua yvonne began in a resolute voice if I am really able to care for the sticky little leaves I shall only love them remembering you it's enough for me that you are somewhere here and I shan't lose my desire for life yet is that enough for you take it as a declaration of love if you like and now you go to the right and I to the left and it's enough do you hear enough I mean even if I don't go away tomorrow I think I certainly shall go and we meet again don't say a word more on these subjects I beg that particularly and about Dmitri too I ask you especially never to speak to me again he added with sudden irritation it's all exhausted it has all been said over and over again hasn't it and I'll make you one promise in return for it when at thirty I want to dash the cup to the ground wherever I may be I'll come to have one more talk with you even though it were from America you may be sure of that I'll come on purpose it will be very interesting to have a look at you to see what you'll be by that time it's rather a solemn promise you see and we really may be parting for seven years or ten go now to your pater Seraficus he is dying if he dies without you you'll be angry with me for having kept you goodbye kiss me once more that's right now go Ivan turned suddenly and went his way without looking back it was just as Dmitri had left Alyosha the day before though the parting had been very different the strange resemblance flashed like an arrow through Alyosha's mind in the distress and dejection of that moment he waited a little looking after his brother he suddenly noticed that Ivan swayed as he walked and that his right shoulder looked lower than his left he'd never noticed it before but all at once he turned two and almost ran to the monastery it was nearly dark and he felt almost frightened something new was growing up in him for which he could not account the wind had risen again as on the previous evening and the ancient pines murmured gloomily about him when he entered the hermitage copes he almost ran pater Seraficus he got that name from somewhere where from Alyosha wondered Ivan poor Ivan and when shall I see you again here is the hermitage yes yes that he is pater Seraficus he will save me from him and forever several times afterwards he wondered how he could on leaving Ivan so completely forget his brother Dmitri though he had that morning only a few hours before so firmly resolved to find him and not to give up doing so even should he be unable to return to the monastery that night end of chapter five of book five