feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_3_part_3.txt
feat_book_id: The Brothers Karamazov.book 3.chapter 3
feat_summary_id: book 3, chapter 3
feat_summary: {"name": "book 3, Chapter 3", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section4/", "summary": "The Confession of an Ardent Heart. In Verse Alyosha leaves the monastery, as he has been ordered to do by both Zosima and his father. A wealthy gentlewoman friend of the Karamazovs, Madame Khokhlakov, has given Alyosha a note from Katerina, Dmitri's abandoned fiancee, asking him to visit her. Somewhat nervous about the prospect, Alyosha sets off for Katerina's house before returning to his father's. Alyosha assumes that he will not see Ivan or Dmitri at Katerina's house, though he thinks he would like to talk to Dmitri before he sees Katerina. Taking a shortcut to Katerina's house, he is surprised by Dmitri, who intercepts him on the path", "analysis": ""}
text: Chapter III. The Confession Of A Passionate Heart--In Verse
  
  
  Alyosha remained for some time irresolute after hearing the command his
  father shouted to him from the carriage. But in spite of his uneasiness he
  did not stand still. That was not his way. He went at once to the kitchen
  to find out what his father had been doing above. Then he set off,
  trusting that on the way he would find some answer to the doubt tormenting
  him. I hasten to add that his father's shouts, commanding him to return
  home "with his mattress and pillow" did not frighten him in the least. He
  understood perfectly that those peremptory shouts were merely "a flourish"
  to produce an effect. In the same way a tradesman in our town who was
  celebrating his name-day with a party of friends, getting angry at being
  refused more vodka, smashed up his own crockery and furniture and tore his
  own and his wife's clothes, and finally broke his windows, all for the
  sake of effect. Next day, of course, when he was sober, he regretted the
  broken cups and saucers. Alyosha knew that his father would let him go
  back to the monastery next day, possibly even that evening. Moreover, he
  was fully persuaded that his father might hurt any one else, but would not
  hurt him. Alyosha was certain that no one in the whole world ever would
  want to hurt him, and, what is more, he knew that no one could hurt him.
  This was for him an axiom, assumed once for all without question, and he
  went his way without hesitation, relying on it.
  
  But at that moment an anxiety of a different sort disturbed him, and
  worried him the more because he could not formulate it. It was the fear of
  a woman, of Katerina Ivanovna, who had so urgently entreated him in the
  note handed to him by Madame Hohlakov to come and see her about something.
  This request and the necessity of going had at once aroused an uneasy
  feeling in his heart, and this feeling had grown more and more painful all
  the morning in spite of the scenes at the hermitage and at the Father
  Superior's. He was not uneasy because he did not know what she would speak
  of and what he must answer. And he was not afraid of her simply as a
  woman. Though he knew little of women, he had spent his life, from early
  childhood till he entered the monastery, entirely with women. He was
  afraid of that woman, Katerina Ivanovna. He had been afraid of her from
  the first time he saw her. He had only seen her two or three times, and
  had only chanced to say a few words to her. He thought of her as a
  beautiful, proud, imperious girl. It was not her beauty which troubled
  him, but something else. And the vagueness of his apprehension increased
  the apprehension itself. The girl's aims were of the noblest, he knew
  that. She was trying to save his brother Dmitri simply through generosity,
  though he had already behaved badly to her. Yet, although Alyosha
  recognized and did justice to all these fine and generous sentiments, a
  shiver began to run down his back as soon as he drew near her house.
  
  He reflected that he would not find Ivan, who was so intimate a friend,
  with her, for Ivan was certainly now with his father. Dmitri he was even
  more certain not to find there, and he had a foreboding of the reason. And
  so his conversation would be with her alone. He had a great longing to run
  and see his brother Dmitri before that fateful interview. Without showing
  him the letter, he could talk to him about it. But Dmitri lived a long way
  off, and he was sure to be away from home too. Standing still for a
  minute, he reached a final decision. Crossing himself with a rapid and
  accustomed gesture, and at once smiling, he turned resolutely in the
  direction of his terrible lady.
  
  He knew her house. If he went by the High Street and then across the
  market-place, it was a long way round. Though our town is small, it is
  scattered, and the houses are far apart. And meanwhile his father was
  expecting him, and perhaps had not yet forgotten his command. He might be
  unreasonable, and so he had to make haste to get there and back. So he
  decided to take a short cut by the back-way, for he knew every inch of the
  ground. This meant skirting fences, climbing over hurdles, and crossing
  other people's back-yards, where every one he met knew him and greeted
  him. In this way he could reach the High Street in half the time.
  
  He had to pass the garden adjoining his father's, and belonging to a
  little tumbledown house with four windows. The owner of this house, as
  Alyosha knew, was a bedridden old woman, living with her daughter, who had
  been a genteel maid-servant in generals' families in Petersburg. Now she
  had been at home a year, looking after her sick mother. She always dressed
  up in fine clothes, though her old mother and she had sunk into such
  poverty that they went every day to Fyodor Pavlovitch's kitchen for soup
  and bread, which Marfa gave readily. Yet, though the young woman came up
  for soup, she had never sold any of her dresses, and one of these even had
  a long train--a fact which Alyosha had learned from Rakitin, who always
  knew everything that was going on in the town. He had forgotten it as soon
  as he heard it, but now, on reaching the garden, he remembered the dress
  with the train, raised his head, which had been bowed in thought, and came
  upon something quite unexpected.
  
  Over the hurdle in the garden, Dmitri, mounted on something, was leaning
  forward, gesticulating violently, beckoning to him, obviously afraid to
  utter a word for fear of being overheard. Alyosha ran up to the hurdle.
  
  "It's a good thing you looked up. I was nearly shouting to you," Mitya
  said in a joyful, hurried whisper. "Climb in here quickly! How splendid
  that you've come! I was just thinking of you!"
  
  Alyosha was delighted too, but he did not know how to get over the hurdle.
  Mitya put his powerful hand under his elbow to help him jump. Tucking up
  his cassock, Alyosha leapt over the hurdle with the agility of a bare-
  legged street urchin.
  
  "Well done! Now come along," said Mitya in an enthusiastic whisper.
  
  "Where?" whispered Alyosha, looking about him and finding himself in a
  deserted garden with no one near but themselves. The garden was small, but
  the house was at least fifty paces away.
  
  "There's no one here. Why do you whisper?" asked Alyosha.
  
  "Why do I whisper? Deuce take it!" cried Dmitri at the top of his voice.
  "You see what silly tricks nature plays one. I am here in secret, and on
  the watch. I'll explain later on, but, knowing it's a secret, I began
  whispering like a fool, when there's no need. Let us go. Over there. Till
  then be quiet. I want to kiss you.
  
  
      Glory to God in the world,
      Glory to God in me ...
  
  
  I was just repeating that, sitting here, before you came."
  
  The garden was about three acres in extent, and planted with trees only
  along the fence at the four sides. There were apple-trees, maples, limes
  and birch-trees. The middle of the garden was an empty grass space, from
  which several hundredweight of hay was carried in the summer. The garden
  was let out for a few roubles for the summer. There were also plantations
  of raspberries and currants and gooseberries laid out along the sides; a
  kitchen garden had been planted lately near the house.
  
  Dmitri led his brother to the most secluded corner of the garden. There,
  in a thicket of lime-trees and old bushes of black currant, elder,
  snowball-tree, and lilac, there stood a tumble-down green summer-house,
  blackened with age. Its walls were of lattice-work, but there was still a
  roof which could give shelter. God knows when this summer-house was built.
  There was a tradition that it had been put up some fifty years before by a
  retired colonel called von Schmidt, who owned the house at that time. It
  was all in decay, the floor was rotting, the planks were loose, the
  woodwork smelled musty. In the summer-house there was a green wooden table
  fixed in the ground, and round it were some green benches upon which it
  was still possible to sit. Alyosha had at once observed his brother's
  exhilarated condition, and on entering the arbor he saw half a bottle of
  brandy and a wineglass on the table.
  
  "That's brandy," Mitya laughed. "I see your look: 'He's drinking again!'
  Distrust the apparition.
  
  
      Distrust the worthless, lying crowd,
      And lay aside thy doubts.
  
  
  I'm not drinking, I'm only 'indulging,' as that pig, your Rakitin, says.
  He'll be a civil councilor one day, but he'll always talk about
  'indulging.' Sit down. I could take you in my arms, Alyosha, and press you
  to my bosom till I crush you, for in the whole world--in reality--in re-al-
  i-ty--(can you take it in?) I love no one but you!"
  
  He uttered the last words in a sort of exaltation.
  
  "No one but you and one 'jade' I have fallen in love with, to my ruin. But
  being in love doesn't mean loving. You may be in love with a woman and yet
  hate her. Remember that! I can talk about it gayly still. Sit down here by
  the table and I'll sit beside you and look at you, and go on talking. You
  shall keep quiet and I'll go on talking, for the time has come. But on
  reflection, you know, I'd better speak quietly, for here--here--you can
  never tell what ears are listening. I will explain everything; as they
  say, 'the story will be continued.' Why have I been longing for you? Why
  have I been thirsting for you all these days, and just now? (It's five
  days since I've cast anchor here.) Because it's only to you I can tell
  everything; because I must, because I need you, because to-morrow I shall
  fly from the clouds, because to-morrow life is ending and beginning. Have
  you ever felt, have you ever dreamt of falling down a precipice into a
  pit? That's just how I'm falling, but not in a dream. And I'm not afraid,
  and don't you be afraid. At least, I am afraid, but I enjoy it. It's not
  enjoyment though, but ecstasy. Damn it all, whatever it is! A strong
  spirit, a weak spirit, a womanish spirit--whatever it is! Let us praise
  nature: you see what sunshine, how clear the sky is, the leaves are all
  green, it's still summer; four o'clock in the afternoon and the stillness!
  Where were you going?"
  
  "I was going to father's, but I meant to go to Katerina Ivanovna's first."
  
  "To her, and to father! Oo! what a coincidence! Why was I waiting for you?
  Hungering and thirsting for you in every cranny of my soul and even in my
  ribs? Why, to send you to father and to her, Katerina Ivanovna, so as to
  have done with her and with father. To send an angel. I might have sent
  any one, but I wanted to send an angel. And here you are on your way to
  see father and her."
  
  "Did you really mean to send me?" cried Alyosha with a distressed
  expression.
  
  "Stay! You knew it! And I see you understand it all at once. But be quiet,
  be quiet for a time. Don't be sorry, and don't cry."
  
  Dmitri stood up, thought a moment, and put his finger to his forehead.
  
  "She's asked you, written to you a letter or something, that's why you're
  going to her? You wouldn't be going except for that?"
  
  "Here is her note." Alyosha took it out of his pocket. Mitya looked
  through it quickly.
  
  "And you were going the back-way! Oh, gods, I thank you for sending him by
  the back-way, and he came to me like the golden fish to the silly old
  fishermen in the fable! Listen, Alyosha, listen, brother! Now I mean to
  tell you everything, for I must tell some one. An angel in heaven I've
  told already; but I want to tell an angel on earth. You are an angel on
  earth. You will hear and judge and forgive. And that's what I need, that
  some one above me should forgive. Listen! If two people break away from
  everything on earth and fly off into the unknown, or at least one of them,
  and before flying off or going to ruin he comes to some one else and says,
  'Do this for me'--some favor never asked before that could only be asked on
  one's deathbed--would that other refuse, if he were a friend or a brother?"
  
  "I will do it, but tell me what it is, and make haste," said Alyosha.
  
  "Make haste! H'm!... Don't be in a hurry, Alyosha, you hurry and worry
  yourself. There's no need to hurry now. Now the world has taken a new
  turning. Ah, Alyosha, what a pity you can't understand ecstasy. But what
  am I saying to him? As though you didn't understand it. What an ass I am!
  What am I saying? 'Be noble, O man!'--who says that?"
  
  Alyosha made up his mind to wait. He felt that, perhaps, indeed, his work
  lay here. Mitya sank into thought for a moment, with his elbow on the
  table and his head in his hand. Both were silent.
  
  "Alyosha," said Mitya, "you're the only one who won't laugh. I should like
  to begin--my confession--with Schiller's _Hymn to Joy_, _An die Freude_! I
  don't know German, I only know it's called that. Don't think I'm talking
  nonsense because I'm drunk. I'm not a bit drunk. Brandy's all very well,
  but I need two bottles to make me drunk:
  
  
      Silenus with his rosy phiz
      Upon his stumbling ass.
  
  
  But I've not drunk a quarter of a bottle, and I'm not Silenus. I'm not
  Silenus, though I am strong,(1) for I've made a decision once for all.
  Forgive me the pun; you'll have to forgive me a lot more than puns to-day.
  Don't be uneasy. I'm not spinning it out. I'm talking sense, and I'll come
  to the point in a minute. I won't keep you in suspense. Stay, how does it
  go?"
  
  He raised his head, thought a minute, and began with enthusiasm:
  
  
      "Wild and fearful in his cavern
       Hid the naked troglodyte,
       And the homeless nomad wandered
       Laying waste the fertile plain.
       Menacing with spear and arrow
       In the woods the hunter strayed....
       Woe to all poor wretches stranded
       On those cruel and hostile shores!
  
      "From the peak of high Olympus
       Came the mother Ceres down,
       Seeking in those savage regions
       Her lost daughter Proserpine.
       But the Goddess found no refuge,
       Found no kindly welcome there,
       And no temple bearing witness
       To the worship of the gods.
  
      "From the fields and from the vineyards
       Came no fruits to deck the feasts,
       Only flesh of bloodstained victims
       Smoldered on the altar-fires,
       And where'er the grieving goddess
       Turns her melancholy gaze,
       Sunk in vilest degradation
       Man his loathsomeness displays."
  
  
  Mitya broke into sobs and seized Alyosha's hand.
  
  "My dear, my dear, in degradation, in degradation now, too. There's a
  terrible amount of suffering for man on earth, a terrible lot of trouble.
  Don't think I'm only a brute in an officer's uniform, wallowing in dirt
  and drink. I hardly think of anything but of that degraded man--if only I'm
  not lying. I pray God I'm not lying and showing off. I think about that
  man because I am that man myself.
  
  
      Would he purge his soul from vileness
      And attain to light and worth,
      He must turn and cling for ever
      To his ancient Mother Earth.
  
  
  But the difficulty is how am I to cling for ever to Mother Earth. I don't
  kiss her. I don't cleave to her bosom. Am I to become a peasant or a
  shepherd? I go on and I don't know whether I'm going to shame or to light
  and joy. That's the trouble, for everything in the world is a riddle! And
  whenever I've happened to sink into the vilest degradation (and it's
  always been happening) I always read that poem about Ceres and man. Has it
  reformed me? Never! For I'm a Karamazov. For when I do leap into the pit,
  I go headlong with my heels up, and am pleased to be falling in that
  degrading attitude, and pride myself upon it. And in the very depths of
  that degradation I begin a hymn of praise. Let me be accursed. Let me be
  vile and base, only let me kiss the hem of the veil in which my God is
  shrouded. Though I may be following the devil, I am Thy son, O Lord, and I
  love Thee, and I feel the joy without which the world cannot stand.
  
  
      Joy everlasting fostereth
      The soul of all creation,
      It is her secret ferment fires
      The cup of life with flame.
      'Tis at her beck the grass hath turned
      Each blade towards the light
      And solar systems have evolved
      From chaos and dark night,
      Filling the realms of boundless space
      Beyond the sage's sight.
      At bounteous Nature's kindly breast,
      All things that breathe drink Joy,
      And birds and beasts and creeping things
      All follow where She leads.
      Her gifts to man are friends in need,
      The wreath, the foaming must,
      To angels--vision of God's throne,
      To insects--sensual lust.
  
  
  But enough poetry! I am in tears; let me cry. It may be foolishness that
  every one would laugh at. But you won't laugh. Your eyes are shining, too.
  Enough poetry. I want to tell you now about the insects to whom God gave
  "sensual lust."
  
  
      To insects--sensual lust.
  
  
  I am that insect, brother, and it is said of me specially. All we
  Karamazovs are such insects, and, angel as you are, that insect lives in
  you, too, and will stir up a tempest in your blood. Tempests, because
  sensual lust is a tempest--worse than a tempest! Beauty is a terrible and
  awful thing! It is terrible because it has not been fathomed and never can
  be fathomed, for God sets us nothing but riddles. Here the boundaries meet
  and all contradictions exist side by side. I am not a cultivated man,
  brother, but I've thought a lot about this. It's terrible what mysteries
  there are! Too many riddles weigh men down on earth. We must solve them as
  we can, and try to keep a dry skin in the water. Beauty! I can't endure
  the thought that a man of lofty mind and heart begins with the ideal of
  the Madonna and ends with the ideal of Sodom. What's still more awful is
  that a man with the ideal of Sodom in his soul does not renounce the ideal
  of the Madonna, and his heart may be on fire with that ideal, genuinely on
  fire, just as in his days of youth and innocence. Yes, man is broad, too
  broad, indeed. I'd have him narrower. The devil only knows what to make of
  it! What to the mind is shameful is beauty and nothing else to the heart.
  Is there beauty in Sodom? Believe me, that for the immense mass of mankind
  beauty is found in Sodom. Did you know that secret? The awful thing is
  that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are
  fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man. But a man always
  talks of his own ache. Listen, now to come to facts."
  
  
  
  
  
feat_summary_name: book 3, Chapter 3
target: The Confession of an Ardent Heart. In Verse Alyosha leaves the monastery, as he has been ordered to do by both Zosima and his father. A wealthy gentlewoman friend of the Karamazovs, Madame Khokhlakov, has given Alyosha a note from Katerina, Dmitri's abandoned fiancee, asking him to visit her. Somewhat nervous about the prospect, Alyosha sets off for Katerina's house before returning to his father's. Alyosha assumes that he will not see Ivan or Dmitri at Katerina's house, though he thinks he would like to talk to Dmitri before he sees Katerina. Taking a shortcut to Katerina's house, he is surprised by Dmitri, who intercepts him on the path