“The word ‘honor’ means duty,” he said (I’m conveying only the sense, as far as I remember it). “When the state is ruled by a dominant estate, the land stands firm. The dominant estate always has its honor and its profession of honor, which may also be wrong, but which almost always serves to bind and strengthen the land; it is useful morally, but more so politically. But the slaves suffer, that is, all who do not belong to that estate.
So that they won’t suffer, they are granted equal rights. That has been done with us as well, and it’s splendid. But by all experience, everywhere so far (in Europe, that is), with the equalizing of rights has come a lowering of the sense of honor and therefore of duty. Egoism has replaced the former binding idea, and everything has broken down into the freedom of persons. Set free, left without a binding thought, they have finally lost all higher connection to such a degree that they have even stopped defending the freedom they obtained. But the Russian type of nobility has never resembled the European. Even now our nobility, having lost its rights, could remain a higher estate as the guardian of honor, light, science, and the higher idea, and, above all, without shutting itself up in a separate caste, which would be the death of the idea. On the contrary, the gateway to this estate was thrown open with us all too long ago; and now the time has come to open it definitively. Let every deed of honor, science, and valor give anyone the right to join the higher category of people. In this way the estate turns by itself into what is merely a gathering of the best people, in the literal and true sense, and not in the former sense of a privileged caste. In this new or, better, renewed form, the estate might hold out.”
The prince bared his teeth:
“What kind of nobility would it be then? That’s some sort of Masonic lodge you’re planning, not a nobility.”
I repeat, the prince was terribly uneducated. I even swung around on the sofa in vexation, though I did not quite agree with Versilov. Versilov understood only too well that the prince was showing his teeth.
“I don’t know in what sense you spoke of Masonry,” he replied, “however, if even a Russian prince rejects such an idea, then, naturally, its time hasn’t come yet. The idea of honor and enlightenment as the covenant of each one who wants to join the estate, which is open and continually renewed, is of course a utopia, but why is it impossible? If this thought still lives, though only in a few heads, it’s not lost yet, but shines like a fiery spot in the deep darkness.”
“You love to use the words ‘higher thought,’ ‘great thought,’ ‘binding idea,’ and so on. I’d like to know, what essentially do you mean by the words ‘a great thought’?”
“I really don’t know how to answer you on that, my dear prince.” Versilov smiled subtly. “If I confess to you that I’m unable to answer it myself, that would be more accurate. A great thought is most often a feeling that sometimes goes without definition for too long. I know only that it was always that from which living life flowed—that is, not mental and contrived, but, on the contrary, amusing and gay; so that the higher idea from which it flows is decidedly necessary, to the general vexation, of course.”
“Why vexation?”
“Because it’s boring to live with ideas, and without ideas it’s always fun.”
The prince ate the pill.
“And what, in your opinion, is this living life?” (He was obviously angry.)
“I don’t know that either, Prince; I only know that it must be something terribly simple, most ordinary, staring us in the face every day and every minute, and so simple that we just can’t believe it could be so simple, and naturally we’ve been passing it by for many thousands of years now without noticing or recognizing it.”
“I only wanted to say that your idea of the nobility is at the same time a denial of the nobility,” said the prince.
“Well, since you’re so insistent, maybe the nobility never existed among us.”
“This is all terribly obscure and vague. If you speak, then, in my opinion, you have to develop . . .”
The prince furrowed his brow and glanced fleetingly at the wall clock. Versilov got up and took his hat.
“Develop?” he said. “No, better not develop, and what’s more it’s my passion—to speak without developing. That’s really so. And here’s another strange thing: if it happens that I begin to develop a thought I believe in, the result is almost always that by the end of the explanation I myself have ceased to believe in what I’ve explained. I’m afraid I’ll fall into that now, too. Good-bye, dear Prince; I’m always unpardonably garrulous with you.”
He left. The prince politely saw him off, but I felt offended.
“What are you so ruffled up for?” he suddenly shot out, not looking and walking past me to the desk.
“I’m ruffled up,” I began with a tremor in my voice, “because, finding such a strange change in your tone towards me and even towards Versilov, I . . . Of course, Versilov maybe did begin in a somewhat retrograde way, but he got better and . . . his words maybe contained a profound thought, but you simply didn’t understand and . . .”
“I simply don’t want anybody popping up to teach me and considering me a little boy!” he snapped almost with wrath.
“Prince, such words . . .”
“Please, no theatrical gestures—do me a favor. I know that what I’m doing is mean, that I’m a squanderer, a gambler, maybe a thief . . . yes, a thief, because I lost my family’s money at gambling, but I don’t want any judges over me. Don’t want it and won’t allow it. I’m my own judge. And why these ambiguities? If he wanted to say something to me, then speak directly and don’t prophesy in a foggy muddle. But to say that to me, you’ve got to have the right, you’ve got to be honorable yourself . . .”
“First of all, I didn’t catch the beginning and don’t know what you were talking about, and second, how is Versilov dishonorable, may I ask?”
“Enough, I beg you, enough. Yesterday you asked for three hundred roubles—here it is . . .” He put the money on the table in front of me, and himself sat in an armchair, leaned back nervously, and crossed one leg over the other. I stopped in embarrassment.
“I don’t know . . .” I murmured, “I did ask you . . . and I need the money very badly now, but in view of such a tone . . .”
“Forget the tone. If I said anything sharp, forgive me. I assure you, I have other things on my mind. Listen to this: I’ve received a letter from Moscow; my brother Sasha—he’s still a child, you know—died four days ago. My father, as you’re also aware, has been paralyzed for two years, and now they write that he’s worse, can’t say a word, and doesn’t recognize anybody. They’re glad of the inheritance there and want to take him abroad; but the doctor writes to me that it’s unlikely he’ll live even two weeks. Which means that mother, my sister, and I are left, and that means I’m almost alone now . . . Well, in short, I’m alone . . . This inheritance . . . This inheritance—oh, maybe it would be better if it didn’t come at all! But here’s precisely what I wanted to tell you: I promised Andrei Petrovich a minimum of twenty thousand from this inheritance . . . And meanwhile, imagine, owing to formalities, so far it’s been impossible to do anything. I even . . . we, that is . . . that is, my father hasn’t come into possession of this estate yet. Meanwhile, I’ve lost so much money these last three weeks, and that scoundrel Stebelkov charges such interest . . . I’ve now given you almost the last . . .”
“Oh, Prince, if so . . .”
“I don’t mean that, I don’t mean that. Stebelkov is sure to bring some today, and I’ll have enough to tide me over, but devil knows about this Stebelkov! I begged him to get me ten thousand, so that I could at least give ten thousand to Andrei Petrovich. My promise to allot him a third torments me, tortures me. I gave my word and I must keep it. And, I swear to you, I’m dying to free myself of obligations at least on that side. They’re a burden to me, a burden, unbearable! This burdensome connection . . . I can’t see Andrei Petrovich, because I can’t look him straight in the eye . . . Why, then, does
