21 ) I spoke to Evgenie Ivanovich and said to him that I envy his freedom; but he said to me that things are very difficult for him just on ac-count of this freedom and even on account of the authority and the responsibility which is con-nected with it. So that it only seems to me, that some one is better off and that another is worse, as the strong man to the weak, the healthy to the sick, the rich to the poor. And it became sud-denly clear to me that all the differences in our conditions in the world are as nothing compared with our inner conditions. It is just the same, as
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it would be a matter of indifference if a man fell from a boat into the Azov Sea, the Black, the Mediterranean or into the ocean, in comparison with whether he was able to swim or not.
22) I spoke with P about the woman question. There is no woman question. There is the ques-tion of freedom of equality for all human beings. The woman question is only quarrel hunting.
23) The more one is guilty before his own conscience, though hidden, the more willingly and involuntarily he seeks the guilt of others and es-pecially those before whom he had been guilty.
24) As soon as you go away into the past or the future, you go away from God and then you immediately become lonely, deserted, unfree.
25) I began to think about myself, about my own hurts and my own future life and I came to my senses. And it was so natural to say to myself: and you, what business is Leo Nicholaie-vich (Tolstoi) of yours? And I felt better. Thus there is the one who is hindered by the base, stupid, vain, sensual, Leo Nicholaievich.
26) As soon as you begin to think of the fu-ture, you begin to guess. If the patience comes out, then this will happen. But this is madness! And it is bound to come, because to think of the future is the beginning of madness.
I have finished everything. It is now past one, the 2 1 st.
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April 12. Moscow.
Among the events during this time was the arrival of the Dukhobors, 300 the cares for their emigration, the death of Brashnin. 301 Occupa-tions: Carthago delenda est so2 and Hadji Murad. Worked rather little. The spiritual state rather good. Visitors most of them peasants, young, good ones.
Since yesterday have been in a very depressed mood. I am not surrendering, I do not disclose myself to any one, but to God. I think that is very important. It is important to keep silent and to suffer a thing through. Otherwise the suffer-ing will go over to others and will make them suffer, but here it will burn itself down in yourself. That is the most precious of all.
This thought helps very much, that in this lies my task, in this is my opportunity to elevate my-self, to approach perfection somewhat. Come and dwell within me so that my baseness will be stifled. Awake in me.
I want to cry all the time.
Thought and noted :
i ) I found jotted down : “ Every victory over the enemy is an enlargement of one’s own strength.” I ought to remember that now espe-cially. There is a struggle going on between my
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spiritual and animal self, and all that I gain for the former, by all this will I weaken the latter. I carry over from one scale of the weights to an-other. If I fall into temptation, it means a roll-ing down the road to evil; if I resist, it is the be-ginning of a rolling on a new road towards the good.
2) It is astonishing how we get accustomed to the illusion of one’s own individuality, separate-ness from the world. We see, we feel that life compels us every minute to feel our union and de-pendence on the world, makes us feel our incom-pleteness; and we nevertheless believe that we our-selves, our very selves, is something in the name of which we can live. However, when you under-stand this illusion clearly, then you are surprised, how you could not have seen that you are not a piece of a whole, but a manifestation in time and space, of something timeless and infinite.
Women have always recognised the power of men over them. And it could not have been otherwise in an unchristian world. Men are the stronger and men have ruled. It was the same in all the worlds (with the exception of the doubt-ful Amazons and the law of maternity), and it is the same now among .0999 of mankind. But Christianity has appeared and has recognised per-fection not in strength but in love, and by this all the subjected, the captive, the slaves and the
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the women have been freed. But that the free-dom of slaves and women be not a calamity, it is necessary that the freed be Christians, i.e., that they affirm their life in the service of God and people, and not in the service of themselves. Slaves and women are not Christians, and never-theless they are freed. And they are terrible. They act as the main-spring of all the calamities of the world.
What must be done ? Bring slaves and women back again into slavery? That is impossible to do, because there is no one who will do it: Chris-tians cannot subject. And non-Christians will no longer surrender themselves into slavery, but will fight. They will fight among themselves and one or the other will subject and hold the Christians in slavery. What must be done? One thing must be done : attract people to Christianity, turn them into Christians. It is possible to do this only by fulfilling in life the law of Christ.
Help me, Lord. Help me. Come into me, awake in me. Apr. 13. Moscow. If I live.
To-day April 27. Grinevka 3
The 3rd day here. I am all right. A little in-disposed. . . .
The latter days in Moscow I spent finishing Carthago delenda est. I am afraid I have not
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finished it, and that it is still before me. Still I did quite a lot. Here I have not worked at all.
The misery of the famine is by far not as great as it was in 1891. There are so many lies in all the affairs among the upper classes, everything is so tangled up with lies that it is never possible to answer any question, simply for instance, is there a famine? I am going to try to distribute as well as I can the money which has been con-tributed.
Yesterday there was a conversation about the same thing: Is exclusive love good? The resume is this : a moral man will look on exclusive love, it is all the same whether he be married or single as on evil and will fight it; the man, who is little moral, will consider it good and will encourage it. An entirely unmoral man does not even understand it and makes fun of it.
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
