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b) I say that one ought not to resist violence by violence : against me they say, that I say it is not necessary to fight evil;
c) I say that one ought to strive towards chas-tity and that on this road the highest grade will be virginity, and second a clean marriage, the third not a clean, that is, not a monogamous marriage : against me they say, that I deny marriage and I preach the destruction of the human race.
d) I say that art is an infectious activity and that the more infectious art is, the better it is. But that this activity be good or bad, does not depend on how much it satisfies the demands of art, i.e., its infectiousness, but on how much it satisfies the demands of the religious consciousness, i.e., morality, conscience; against me they say that I preach a tendence art, etc.
15) Woman and the legends say it also is the tool of the devil. She is generally stupid, but the devil lends her his brain when she works for him. Here you see, she has done miracles of thinking, far-sightedness, constancy, in order to do something nasty; but as soon as something not nasty is needed, she cannot understand the simplest thing; she cannot see farther than the present moment and there is no self-control and no pa-tience (except child-birth and the care of children) .
1 6) All this concerns women, un-Christians, un-chaste women, as are all the women of our Chris-,
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tian world. Oh, how I would like to show to women all the significance of a chaste woman. A chaste woman (not in vain is the legend of Mary) will save the world.
17) People are occupied with three things: i) to feed themselves, i.e., to continue their existence, 2) to multiply to continue the existence of the specie, and 3) to fulfil that for which they had been sent in the world: to establish the kingdom of God. For this there is one means to perfect onself. Almost all people are occupied with the first two matters, forgetting the last, which at bottom is the only real work.
18) The decline of the moral consciousness of humanity lies in the greatest part of the people be-ing placed in such a situation that all interest in life for them is only to feed and to multiply. It is just the same as if the master kept his cattle, car-ing only that they be fed, or better, that they do not die from hunger and that they multiply, and never received any income from them : no wool, or milk, or work from them from these cattle. The Master who sent us in this world requires from us, besides existence and its continuation, also the labour He needs.
19) For Resurrection. It was impossible to think and remember one’s sin and be self-satisfied. But he had to be self-satisfied in order to live, and therefore he did not think and forgot.
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20) It is impossible to demand from woman that she valuate the feeling of her exclusive love, on the basis of moral feeling. She cannot do it, because she hasn’t got a real moral feeling, i.e., one that stands higher than everything.
To-day I plan to go home.
Aug. 4. Y. P. If I live.
Why does the 4th of August come to my mine as if it were important? Nothing important has happened.
To-day, August 24. Y. P.
During this time I received no letters from Chertkov and am very perplexed. 356 I think that during this time the Dukhobors were here. Let-ters from Khilkov, from Ivan Michailovich. I an-swered them all. To-day Sullerzhitsky arrived. 357 I am working all the time on Resurrection and am pleased, even very much so. I am afraid of shocks.
. . . And I feel well. A full house of people : Mashenka, 358 Stakhovich, Vera Kuzminsky, 359 Vera Tolstoi. 880
I am copying:
i) People were sent into the world to do the work of God, but they quarrelled, fought and es-tablished things in such a way that for some, there is no time to do the work, because they have to
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feed themselves, and for others there is no time, because they have to guard that which they took away. What a waste of strength! It is just as if workers had been sent to work and given food; some have taken the food away and they have to guard it and the others have to get food, and the work stands still.
2) People live in the world not fulfilling their mission it is the same way as if factory work-ers were only busied with how to lodge them-selves, feed themselves and amuse themselves.
3) One of the most important tasks of hu-manity consists in the bringing up of a chaste woman.
4) I often think that the world is such as it is, only because I am so separated from all the rest. As soon as my separateness from Everything will end, then the limits will be torn away and other limits will be established and then the world will become altogether different for me.
5) You wish to serve humanity? Very well. That which you wish to do, another will do. Are you satisfied? No, dissatisfied, because the im-portant thing for me is not what will be done, but what / will do; that I do my work. This is the best proof that the matter is not in the doing, but in the advancement towards the good.
Is it possible that I am advancing? Help, Lord.
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6) How difficult it is to please people: some need one thing, others another. They need both my past and my future. God is one, and His Will in respect to me is one, and He wants only my present, what I am doing this minute is what He wants. And what was, has been, and what will be, isn’t my business.
7) Egoism, the whole egoistic life, is legitimate only as long as reason has not awakened. As soon as it has awakened, then egoism is lawful, only to that degree in which one has to sustain oneself as a tool necessary for the service of people. The purpose of reason is the service to people. All the horror lies in its being used for service to one-self.
8) Man gives himself to the illusion of e.goism, lives for himself and he suffers. It suffices that he begin to live for others, and the suffering becomes lighter and there is obtained the highest good in the world : love of people.
9) As one disaccustoms oneself from smoking or other habits, so one can and must disaccustom oneself from egoism. When you wish to enlarge your pleasure, when you wish to exhibit yourself, when you call forth love in others, stop. If you have nothing to do for others, or you have no de-sire to do anything, then do nothing only don’t do anything for yourself.
10) The Bavarian told about their life. He
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boasts about the high degree of freedom, but at the same time they have compulsory religious teaching, a crude Catholic one. That is the most horrible despotism. Worse than ours. Aug. 25. Y. P. If I live.
Nov. 2. Y. P.
It is horrible to see for what a long time I have made no entries : more than two months. And not only has there been nothing bad, but rather every-thing was good. The Jubilee was not as repuls-ive and as depressing as I expected. 361 The sale of the novel and the receipt of the 12,000 roubles which I gave to the Dukhobors was well ar-ranged. 362 I was displeased with Chertkov 363 and I saw that I was at fault. A Dukhobor ar-rived from the province of Yakutsk. I liked him very much 364 . . .
Masha is pitiable in her weakness, but she is just as near in spirit. . . .
But glory to God and thanks be to Him that he has awakened it in me and has kept it burning so that it is natural for me either to love and re-joice, or to love and to pity. And what happi-ness!
Archer was here yesterday, arriving from Chertkov I liked him. 365 There is much to do, but I am all absorbed in Resurrection, being spar-ing with the water and using it only for Resurrec-
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tion. It seems to me it won’t be bad. People praise it, but I don’t believe.
Everything that I noted it was all very im-portant I will write out later, but now I want to write that which I just now, walking on the path, in the evening, not only thought but felt clearly:
i) Under my feet there is the frozen, hard earth; around, enormous trees; overhead a cloudy sky; I feel my body, I feel pain in the head; I am occupied with thoughts on Resurrection; and yet I know, I feel in all my being, that both the firm and frozen earth and the trees and the sky and my body and my thoughts all this is only a product of my five senses, my image, the world, made by me because such is my partition from the world. And that it will be sufficient for me to die and all this will not disappear but will become transformed, as they make
