The Russkia Viedomosti was suspended be-cause of the Dukhobors and of me; that is too bad and I am grieved. 304
1) The proverb: for a good son you do not have to make a fortune, for a bad one, do not leave one.
2) I have made the following note: “God doesn’t know when the awakening of people will take place.” This is what it means : I think that the life of humanity consists in a greater and
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greater awakening, in an enlightening. And this awakening, this enlightening, will be done by peo-ple themselves (by God in people). And in this is life, in this is the good, and therefore this life and this good cannot be taken away from peo-ple.
3) My awakening consisted in this, that I doubted the reality of the material world. It lost all meaning to me.
To-morrow Apr. 28. Grinevka. If I live, I’ll finish.
To-day Apr. 29. Morning. Grinevka.
Felt great weakness. Am better since yester-day. But unable to write anything. Went to Lopashino, 305 took notes. 306
Read Boccaccio it is the beginning of the master-class, immoral art.
No letters. Serezha was here. 807
Random break
I continue. Thought:
i) You look deeply into the life of man, es-pecially of women, and you see from what world point of view their acts flow, and you see, principally, how inevitably all argument against this world point of view recoils and you cannot imagine how this world point of view will be changed in the same way as how a piece of a date-stone has grown through a date. But there are conditions when a change is produced
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and accomplished from within. Live man can al-ways be born, from seeds there are sprouts.
2) I look into the future, and ask: were I to act as I ought to, would everything then be all right, would all obstacles then be destroyed? This question is pleonism. The question is this, whether, were I to act in a realm where there were no obstacles, would there then be any ob-stacles ?
3) It is remarkable how we are without under-standing and without gratitude. God arranged our life so, that he forbade us all false paths, that everything drives us from these false, harmful paths, impoverishing us to ruination, and making us suffer, onto the only free, always joyous path of love but we nevertheless do not go on this path and we complain that we suffer from the at-tempts of going on the false, ruinous paths.
4) One of the most urgent needs of man, equal with and even more urgent than eating, drinking, sex desire, and the existence of which we often for-get, is the need to manifest oneself, to know that it is I who have done a thing. Very many acts which are otherwise inexplicable, are explained by this need. One ought to remember this both in their bringing up, and in dealing with men. The main thing is that one has to try to make this an activity and not a boast.
5) Why is it that children and simple people
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are by such an awful height higher than the major-ity of people? Because their reason is not per-verted by the deception of faith or by temptations or by sins. Nothing stands on their road to per-fection, while adults have sin and temptation and deception on theirs. The former have only to walk forward, the latter must struggle.
6) They spoke about love and falling in love, and I made the following conclusion for myself : a moral man fights falling in love and exclusive love, an unmoral man condones it.
7) Children are selfish without lies. All of life teaches the aimlessness, the ruination of self-ishness. And therefore old people attain unself-ishness without lies. These are two extreme limits.
8) I began to consider soup-kitchens and the purchase of flour, and money, and my soul became so unclean and sad. The realm of money, i.e., every kind of use of money, is a sin. I took money and undertook to use it only so as to have a reason for going away from Moscow and I acted badly.
9) I thought much about The Appeal, yester-day and to-day. It became rather clear how a bad arrangement of life results in religious decep-tion. If something is unclear in one’s mind, if life is disorderly and you don’t want any-thing. . . . (Somehow I haven’t succeeded.)
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10) In my sleep I thought to-day that the shortest expression of the meaning of life is this : the world moves, perfects itself; the task of man is to take part in this movement, to submit himself to it and to help it.
My weakness still continues. I have written this out very badly.
May 4. Grinevka. (Evening.)
Yesterday there was a whole house full of guests: The Tsurikovs, Mme. Ilinsky, 308 Stak-hovich. I have done nothing during the day. In the morning I wrote a letter to Chertkov 309 and to S 310 and to still some one else. The day be-fore yesterday I was in Sidorovo and at Se-rezha’s. 311 In the morning I read Chertkov’s article. 312 It is very good.
The ist of May, Lindenberg 313 was here and a teacher 314 and they went to Kamenka. On the 3Oth, I went to Gubarevka.
What hurts me, is that I seem to have lost en-tirely the capacity for writing. To my shame I am indifferent. Latterly in my sleep, I thought keenly about the contrast between the crushed peo-ple and the crushers, but did not write it out.
To-day, yes and in the preceding days, it seemed to me that Hadji Murad became clear, but I could not write it. It is true they interfered.
Thought :
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1 ) Just as an athlete follows the growth of his muscles, so you ought to follow the growth of love, or at least the decrease of evil and lies and life will be full and joyous.
2) Yesterday there was a discussion about the old question : what is better to take part in evil, to endeavour to diminish it (…) or to keep away from it? The eternal objection is: “ There will be anarchy “ yes, but now it is worse than anarchy: injustice. “What, then, if to begin everything from the beginning; the strong will again offend the weak.” Yes, everything from the beginning again, but with this difference, that while now we continue the cruelty and injus-tice which have been established in heathen bar-baric times, we now live in the light of Christian-ity and the cruelty and injustice will not be the same cruelty and injustice. … (It isn’t quite all right, but it was. )
3)! look about me and the lines which I see I force into that form which lives in my imagina-tion. I see white on the horizon and involuntarily I give this white the form of a church. Is it not in this way that everything we see in this world takes on the form which already lives in our imagina-tion (consciousness), which we carried over from our former life? (An idea.)
Exquisite weather. Friendly, hot Spring. I am at peace and am well.
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The Journal of Leo Tolstoi [i May 5. Grinevka. If I live.
To-day May g. Grinevka.
During these days we had visitors: Masha, Varia. 316 I go every day somewhere to open a soup-kitchen. I am not writing at all. I feel weak. Yesterday there was a rain storm. I went to Bobrika. To-day I went to Nicholskoe. I went to Gubarevka and returning through the wood, thought. … I don’t feel like writing, later I shall write out two thoughts, very impor-tant ones:
1 ) One, that I cannot put before me, that which tortured me before : my destruction.
2) That the other life begins to attract me, only the process of getting there is terrible. If only I could arrive safely, everything there will be all right;
3) To-day I thought that the object of faith is only one God. This I must write out, ex-plain.
To-day I am in a very weak state. May 10. Grinevka. If I live.
To-day May n. Grinevka.
Yesterday I wrote a little on The Appeal. Then I went to Mikhail’s Ford.
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that I should write out clearly, for the plain man, what God is. ‘ You ought to write it, Leo Nich-olaievich,” (Tolstoi.)
To-day my stomach ached a little. I didn’t dine and wrote much on The Appeal. It seems to be taking form. I am feeling fresh in the head, a thing I haven’t felt for a long time. Thanks to my gymnastic exercises, I have become convinced for the first time, that I am old and weak and I must stop physical exercise entirely. This is even pleasant.
I forgot for a moment, my rule, not to expect anything from others, but to do what one ought to do oneself before God, and there arose in me an evil feeling. . . . But I remembered, asked in good faith what was necessary and I felt better.
1) There is one object of faith God, He who sent me. He who sent me, He who is every-thing of which I feel myself to be a part. This faith is indispensable and satisfying. If you have this faith then there is no room for any other. Everything else is trust
