The Journal of Leo Tolstoi (First Volume — 1895–1899) · 43

20) Administrative ambition and greed of misers are therefore alluring, because they are very simple. For every other end of life one has to reflect much, to think, and often you do not see the results clearly. And here it is so simple: where there was one decoration there will be two: where there was one million there will be two, etc.

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 account of this freedom and even on account of the authority and the responsibility which is connected 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 suddenly 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[218] 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 question 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 especially 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 Nicholaievich (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 future, 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 21st.

[219]

March 22. Moscow. If I live.

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] Occupations: Carthago delenda est[302] 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 suffering 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 myself, 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:

1) I found jotted down: “Every victory over the enemy is an enlargement of one’s own strength.” I ought to remember that now especially. There is a struggle going on between my[220] 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 another. If I fall into temptation, it means a rolling down the road to evil; if I resist, it is the beginning 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, separateness from the world. We see, we feel—that life compels us every minute to feel our union and dependence on the world, makes us feel our incompleteness; and we nevertheless believe that we ourselves, our very selves, is something in the name of which we can live. However, when you understand 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 doubtful Amazons and the law of maternity), and it is the same now among.0999 of mankind. But Christianity has appeared and has recognised perfection not in strength but in love, and by this all the subjected, the captive, the slaves and the[221] women have been freed. But that the freedom 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 nevertheless 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: Christians 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.[303]

The 3rd day here. I am all right. A little indisposed....

The latter days in Moscow I spent finishing Carthago delenda est. I am afraid I have not[222] 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 contributed.

Yesterday there was a conversation about the same thing: Is exclusive love good? The résumé 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 because 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[223] greater awakening, in an enlightening. And this awakening, this enlightening, will be done by people 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 people.