feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/sparknotes/The Brothers Karamazov/section_8_part_3.txt
feat_book_id: The Brothers Karamazov.book 6.chapter 2
feat_summary_id: book 6, chapter 2
feat_summary: {"name": "book 6, Chapter 2", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210305110438/https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/brothersk/section9/", "summary": "From the Life of the Hieromonk and Elder Zosima, Departed in God, Composed from His Own Words by Alexei Fyodorovich Karamazov Zosima says that he holds Alyosha very dear to his heart because Alyosha reminds him of his older brother, who was a great spiritual influence on him. Zosima's brother was a critic of religion until he came down with consumption at the age of seventeen, at which point he underwent a powerful spiritual change. In the months before he died, he talked continually about loving God's creation and all living things. Zosima says that, in addition to his brother, the greatest influence on his life has been the Bible. But he did not discover the Bible until he was a grown man. In fact, he was a military officer, rather like Dmitri. When the woman Zosima loved married another man, Zosima challenged him to a duel and planned to kill him. But when he woke up on the morning of the duel, he saw the beauty of the world and remembered his brother's commandment to love all living things. He did not back out of the duel, however. Instead, he allowed the other man to take the first shot, and then fell to his knees and began to beg for his forgiveness. Zosima quickly left the army and decided to become a monk. Zosima tells of one night in the past when he received a mysterious visitor, a prominent philanthropist. After asking Zosima about his conversion, and after paying him several more visits, the philanthropist confesses a great crime. He says that he once killed a woman he loved, and another man was arrested for the crime. The man who was arrested died before his trial, and the philanthropist was free. But he tells Zosima that, despite his success in life and his loving family, he has never been satisfied, because he has always longed to make a confession. Zosima encourages him to confess to the people, and after a great deal of soul-searching, the man agrees. He holds a huge birthday party, and, in front of all his guests, reads a statement of guilt. But no one believes him. It is decided that he has gone mad. Soon after, the man falls ill, and Zosima visits him at his deathbed. There, the man tells Zosima that he almost killed Zosima after he confessed his crime. But God, he says, defeated the devil in his heart. A week later, the man died, and Zosima has kept his secret until now", "analysis": ""}
text: Chapter II. The Duel
  
  
  _(c) Recollections of Father Zossima's Youth before he became a Monk. The
  Duel_
  
  I spent a long time, almost eight years, in the military cadet school at
  Petersburg, and in the novelty of my surroundings there, many of my
  childish impressions grew dimmer, though I forgot nothing. I picked up so
  many new habits and opinions that I was transformed into a cruel, absurd,
  almost savage creature. A surface polish of courtesy and society manners I
  did acquire together with the French language.
  
  But we all, myself included, looked upon the soldiers in our service as
  cattle. I was perhaps worse than the rest in that respect, for I was so
  much more impressionable than my companions. By the time we left the
  school as officers, we were ready to lay down our lives for the honor of
  the regiment, but no one of us had any knowledge of the real meaning of
  honor, and if any one had known it, he would have been the first to
  ridicule it. Drunkenness, debauchery and devilry were what we almost
  prided ourselves on. I don't say that we were bad by nature, all these
  young men were good fellows, but they behaved badly, and I worst of all.
  What made it worse for me was that I had come into my own money, and so I
  flung myself into a life of pleasure, and plunged headlong into all the
  recklessness of youth.
  
  I was fond of reading, yet strange to say, the Bible was the one book I
  never opened at that time, though I always carried it about with me, and I
  was never separated from it; in very truth I was keeping that book "for
  the day and the hour, for the month and the year," though I knew it not.
  
  After four years of this life, I chanced to be in the town of K. where our
  regiment was stationed at the time. We found the people of the town
  hospitable, rich and fond of entertainments. I met with a cordial
  reception everywhere, as I was of a lively temperament and was known to be
  well off, which always goes a long way in the world. And then a
  circumstance happened which was the beginning of it all.
  
  I formed an attachment to a beautiful and intelligent young girl of noble
  and lofty character, the daughter of people much respected. They were
  well-to-do people of influence and position. They always gave me a cordial
  and friendly reception. I fancied that the young lady looked on me with
  favor and my heart was aflame at such an idea. Later on I saw and fully
  realized that I perhaps was not so passionately in love with her at all,
  but only recognized the elevation of her mind and character, which I could
  not indeed have helped doing. I was prevented, however, from making her an
  offer at the time by my selfishness, I was loath to part with the
  allurements of my free and licentious bachelor life in the heyday of my
  youth, and with my pockets full of money. I did drop some hint as to my
  feelings however, though I put off taking any decisive step for a time.
  Then, all of a sudden, we were ordered off for two months to another
  district.
  
  On my return two months later, I found the young lady already married to a
  rich neighboring landowner, a very amiable man, still young though older
  than I was, connected with the best Petersburg society, which I was not,
  and of excellent education, which I also was not. I was so overwhelmed at
  this unexpected circumstance that my mind was positively clouded. The
  worst of it all was that, as I learned then, the young landowner had been
  a long while betrothed to her, and I had met him indeed many times in her
  house, but blinded by my conceit I had noticed nothing. And this
  particularly mortified me; almost everybody had known all about it, while
  I knew nothing. I was filled with sudden irrepressible fury. With flushed
  face I began recalling how often I had been on the point of declaring my
  love to her, and as she had not attempted to stop me or to warn me, she
  must, I concluded, have been laughing at me all the time. Later on, of
  course, I reflected and remembered that she had been very far from
  laughing at me; on the contrary, she used to turn off any love-making on
  my part with a jest and begin talking of other subjects; but at that
  moment I was incapable of reflecting and was all eagerness for revenge. I
  am surprised to remember that my wrath and revengeful feelings were
  extremely repugnant to my own nature, for being of an easy temper, I found
  it difficult to be angry with any one for long, and so I had to work
  myself up artificially and became at last revolting and absurd.
  
  I waited for an opportunity and succeeded in insulting my "rival" in the
  presence of a large company. I insulted him on a perfectly extraneous
  pretext, jeering at his opinion upon an important public event--it was in
  the year 1826(5)--and my jeer was, so people said, clever and effective.
  Then I forced him to ask for an explanation, and behaved so rudely that he
  accepted my challenge in spite of the vast inequality between us, as I was
  younger, a person of no consequence, and of inferior rank. I learned
  afterwards for a fact that it was from a jealous feeling on his side also
  that my challenge was accepted; he had been rather jealous of me on his
  wife's account before their marriage; he fancied now that if he submitted
  to be insulted by me and refused to accept my challenge, and if she heard
  of it, she might begin to despise him and waver in her love for him. I
  soon found a second in a comrade, an ensign of our regiment. In those days
  though duels were severely punished, yet dueling was a kind of fashion
  among the officers--so strong and deeply rooted will a brutal prejudice
  sometimes be.
  
  It was the end of June, and our meeting was to take place at seven o'clock
  the next day on the outskirts of the town--and then something happened that
  in very truth was the turning-point of my life. In the evening, returning
  home in a savage and brutal humor, I flew into a rage with my orderly
  Afanasy, and gave him two blows in the face with all my might, so that it
  was covered with blood. He had not long been in my service and I had
  struck him before, but never with such ferocious cruelty. And, believe me,
  though it's forty years ago, I recall it now with shame and pain. I went
  to bed and slept for about three hours; when I waked up the day was
  breaking. I got up--I did not want to sleep any more--I went to the
  window--opened it, it looked out upon the garden; I saw the sun rising; it
  was warm and beautiful, the birds were singing.
  
  "What's the meaning of it?" I thought. "I feel in my heart as it were
  something vile and shameful. Is it because I am going to shed blood? No,"
  I thought, "I feel it's not that. Can it be that I am afraid of death,
  afraid of being killed? No, that's not it, that's not it at all."... And
  all at once I knew what it was: it was because I had beaten Afanasy the
  evening before! It all rose before my mind, it all was as it were repeated
  over again; he stood before me and I was beating him straight on the face
  and he was holding his arms stiffly down, his head erect, his eyes fixed
  upon me as though on parade. He staggered at every blow and did not even
  dare to raise his hands to protect himself. That is what a man has been
  brought to, and that was a man beating a fellow creature! What a crime! It
  was as though a sharp dagger had pierced me right through. I stood as if I
  were struck dumb, while the sun was shining, the leaves were rejoicing and
  the birds were trilling the praise of God.... I hid my face in my hands,
  fell on my bed and broke into a storm of tears. And then I remembered my
  brother Markel and what he said on his death-bed to his servants: "My dear
  ones, why do you wait on me, why do you love me, am I worth your waiting
  on me?"
  
  "Yes, am I worth it?" flashed through my mind. "After all what am I worth,
  that another man, a fellow creature, made in the likeness and image of
  God, should serve me?" For the first time in my life this question forced
  itself upon me. He had said, "Mother, my little heart, in truth we are
  each responsible to all for all, it's only that men don't know this. If
  they knew it, the world would be a paradise at once."
  
  "God, can that too be false?" I thought as I wept. "In truth, perhaps, I
  am more than all others responsible for all, a greater sinner than all men
  in the world." And all at once the whole truth in its full light appeared
  to me; what was I going to do? I was going to kill a good, clever, noble
  man, who had done me no wrong, and by depriving his wife of happiness for
  the rest of her life, I should be torturing and killing her too. I lay
  thus in my bed with my face in the pillow, heedless how the time was
  passing. Suddenly my second, the ensign, came in with the pistols to fetch
  me.
  
  "Ah," said he, "it's a good thing you are up already, it's time we were
  off, come along!"
  
  I did not know what to do and hurried to and fro undecided; we went out to
  the carriage, however.
  
  "Wait here a minute," I said to him. "I'll be back directly, I have
  forgotten my purse."
  
  And I ran back alone, to Afanasy's little room.
  
  "Afanasy," I said, "I gave you two blows on the face yesterday, forgive
  me," I said.
  
  He started as though he were frightened, and looked at me; and I saw that
  it was not enough, and on the spot, in my full officer's uniform, I
  dropped at his feet and bowed my head to the ground.
  
  "Forgive me," I said.
  
  Then he was completely aghast.
  
  "Your honor ... sir, what are you doing? Am I worth it?"
  
  And he burst out crying as I had done before, hid this face in his hands,
  turned to the window and shook all over with his sobs. I flew out to my
  comrade and jumped into the carriage.
  
  "Ready," I cried. "Have you ever seen a conqueror?" I asked him. "Here is
  one before you."
  
  I was in ecstasy, laughing and talking all the way, I don't remember what
  about.
  
  He looked at me. "Well, brother, you are a plucky fellow, you'll keep up
  the honor of the uniform, I can see."
  
  So we reached the place and found them there, waiting us. We were placed
  twelve paces apart; he had the first shot. I stood gayly, looking him full
  in the face; I did not twitch an eyelash, I looked lovingly at him, for I
  knew what I would do. His shot just grazed my cheek and ear.
  
  "Thank God," I cried, "no man has been killed," and I seized my pistol,
  turned back and flung it far away into the wood. "That's the place for
  you," I cried.
  
  I turned to my adversary.
  
  "Forgive me, young fool that I am, sir," I said, "for my unprovoked insult
  to you and for forcing you to fire at me. I am ten times worse than you
  and more, maybe. Tell that to the person whom you hold dearest in the
  world."
  
  I had no sooner said this than they all three shouted at me.
  
  "Upon my word," cried my adversary, annoyed, "if you did not want to
  fight, why did not you let me alone?"
  
  "Yesterday I was a fool, to-day I know better," I answered him gayly.
  
  "As to yesterday, I believe you, but as for to-day, it is difficult to
  agree with your opinion," said he.
  
  "Bravo," I cried, clapping my hands. "I agree with you there too. I have
  deserved it!"
  
  "Will you shoot, sir, or not?"
  
  "No, I won't," I said; "if you like, fire at me again, but it would be
  better for you not to fire."
  
  The seconds, especially mine, were shouting too: "Can you disgrace the
  regiment like this, facing your antagonist and begging his forgiveness! If
  I'd only known this!"
  
  I stood facing them all, not laughing now.
  
  "Gentlemen," I said, "is it really so wonderful in these days to find a
  man who can repent of his stupidity and publicly confess his wrongdoing?"
  
  "But not in a duel," cried my second again.
  
  "That's what's so strange," I said. "For I ought to have owned my fault as
  soon as I got here, before he had fired a shot, before leading him into a
  great and deadly sin; but we have made our life so grotesque, that to act
  in that way would have been almost impossible, for only after I have faced
  his shot at the distance of twelve paces could my words have any
  significance for him, and if I had spoken before, he would have said, 'He
  is a coward, the sight of the pistols has frightened him, no use to listen
  to him.' Gentlemen," I cried suddenly, speaking straight from my heart,
  "look around you at the gifts of God, the clear sky, the pure air, the
  tender grass, the birds; nature is beautiful and sinless, and we, only we,
  are sinful and foolish, and we don't understand that life is heaven, for
  we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all
  its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep."
  
  I would have said more but I could not; my voice broke with the sweetness
  and youthful gladness of it, and there was such bliss in my heart as I had
  never known before in my life.
  
  "All this as rational and edifying," said my antagonist, "and in any case
  you are an original person."
  
  "You may laugh," I said to him, laughing too, "but afterwards you will
  approve of me."
  
  "Oh, I am ready to approve of you now," said he; "will you shake hands?
  for I believe you are genuinely sincere."
  
  "No," I said, "not now, later on when I have grown worthier and deserve
  your esteem, then shake hands and you will do well."
  
  We went home, my second upbraiding me all the way, while I kissed him. All
  my comrades heard of the affair at once and gathered together to pass
  judgment on me the same day.
  
  "He has disgraced the uniform," they said; "let him resign his
  commission."
  
  Some stood up for me: "He faced the shot," they said.
  
  "Yes, but he was afraid of his other shot and begged for forgiveness."
  
  "If he had been afraid of being shot, he would have shot his own pistol
  first before asking forgiveness, while he flung it loaded into the forest.
  No, there's something else in this, something original."
  
  I enjoyed listening and looking at them. "My dear friends and comrades,"
  said I, "don't worry about my resigning my commission, for I have done so
  already. I have sent in my papers this morning and as soon as I get my
  discharge I shall go into a monastery--it's with that object I am leaving
  the regiment."
  
  When I had said this every one of them burst out laughing.
  
  "You should have told us of that first, that explains everything, we can't
  judge a monk."
  
  They laughed and could not stop themselves, and not scornfully, but kindly
  and merrily. They all felt friendly to me at once, even those who had been
  sternest in their censure, and all the following month, before my
  discharge came, they could not make enough of me. "Ah, you monk," they
  would say. And every one said something kind to me, they began trying to
  dissuade me, even to pity me: "What are you doing to yourself?"
  
  "No," they would say, "he is a brave fellow, he faced fire and could have
  fired his own pistol too, but he had a dream the night before that he
  should become a monk, that's why he did it."
  
  It was the same thing with the society of the town. Till then I had been
  kindly received, but had not been the object of special attention, and now
  all came to know me at once and invited me; they laughed at me, but they
  loved me. I may mention that although everybody talked openly of our duel,
  the authorities took no notice of it, because my antagonist was a near
  relation of our general, and as there had been no bloodshed and no serious
  consequences, and as I resigned my commission, they took it as a joke. And
  I began then to speak aloud and fearlessly, regardless of their laughter,
  for it was always kindly and not spiteful laughter. These conversations
  mostly took place in the evenings, in the company of ladies; women
  particularly liked listening to me then and they made the men listen.
  
  "But how can I possibly be responsible for all?" every one would laugh in
  my face. "Can I, for instance, be responsible for you?"
  
  "You may well not know it," I would answer, "since the whole world has
  long been going on a different line, since we consider the veriest lies as
  truth and demand the same lies from others. Here I have for once in my
  life acted sincerely and, well, you all look upon me as a madman. Though
  you are friendly to me, yet, you see, you all laugh at me."
  
  "But how can we help being friendly to you?" said my hostess, laughing.
  The room was full of people. All of a sudden the young lady rose, on whose
  account the duel had been fought and whom only lately I had intended to be
  my future wife. I had not noticed her coming into the room. She got up,
  came to me and held out her hand.
  
  "Let me tell you," she said, "that I am the first not to laugh at you, but
  on the contrary I thank you with tears and express my respect for you for
  your action then."
  
  Her husband, too, came up and then they all approached me and almost
  kissed me. My heart was filled with joy, but my attention was especially
  caught by a middle-aged man who came up to me with the others. I knew him
  by name already, but had never made his acquaintance nor exchanged a word
  with him till that evening.
  
  _(d) The Mysterious Visitor_
  
  He had long been an official in the town; he was in a prominent position,
  respected by all, rich and had a reputation for benevolence. He subscribed
  considerable sums to the almshouse and the orphan asylum; he was very
  charitable, too, in secret, a fact which only became known after his
  death. He was a man of about fifty, almost stern in appearance and not
  much given to conversation. He had been married about ten years and his
  wife, who was still young, had borne him three children. Well, I was
  sitting alone in my room the following evening, when my door suddenly
  opened and this gentleman walked in.
  
  I must mention, by the way, that I was no longer living in my former
  quarters. As soon as I resigned my commission, I took rooms with an old
  lady, the widow of a government clerk. My landlady's servant waited upon
  me, for I had moved into her rooms simply because on my return from the
  duel I had sent Afanasy back to the regiment, as I felt ashamed to look
  him in the face after my last interview with him. So prone is the man of
  the world to be ashamed of any righteous action.
  
  "I have," said my visitor, "with great interest listened to you speaking
  in different houses the last few days and I wanted at last to make your
  personal acquaintance, so as to talk to you more intimately. Can you, dear
  sir, grant me this favor?"
  
  "I can, with the greatest pleasure, and I shall look upon it as an honor."
  I said this, though I felt almost dismayed, so greatly was I impressed
  from the first moment by the appearance of this man. For though other
  people had listened to me with interest and attention, no one had come to
  me before with such a serious, stern and concentrated expression. And now
  he had come to see me in my own rooms. He sat down.
  
  "You are, I see, a man of great strength of character," he said; "as you
  have dared to serve the truth, even when by doing so you risked incurring
  the contempt of all."
  
  "Your praise is, perhaps, excessive," I replied.
  
  "No, it's not excessive," he answered; "believe me, such a course of
  action is far more difficult than you think. It is that which has
  impressed me, and it is only on that account that I have come to you," he
  continued. "Tell me, please, that is if you are not annoyed by my perhaps
  unseemly curiosity, what were your exact sensations, if you can recall
  them, at the moment when you made up your mind to ask forgiveness at the
  duel. Do not think my question frivolous; on the contrary, I have in
  asking the question a secret motive of my own, which I will perhaps
  explain to you later on, if it is God's will that we should become more
  intimately acquainted."
  
  All the while he was speaking, I was looking at him straight into the face
  and I felt all at once a complete trust in him and great curiosity on my
  side also, for I felt that there was some strange secret in his soul.
  
  "You ask what were my exact sensations at the moment when I asked my
  opponent's forgiveness," I answered; "but I had better tell you from the
  beginning what I have not yet told any one else." And I described all that
  had passed between Afanasy and me, and how I had bowed down to the ground
  at his feet. "From that you can see for yourself," I concluded, "that at
  the time of the duel it was easier for me, for I had made a beginning
  already at home, and when once I had started on that road, to go farther
  along it was far from being difficult, but became a source of joy and
  happiness."
  
  I liked the way he looked at me as he listened. "All that," he said, "is
  exceedingly interesting. I will come to see you again and again."
  
  And from that time forth he came to see me nearly every evening. And we
  should have become greater friends, if only he had ever talked of himself.
  But about himself he scarcely ever said a word, yet continually asked me
  about myself. In spite of that I became very fond of him and spoke with
  perfect frankness to him about all my feelings; "for," thought I, "what
  need have I to know his secrets, since I can see without that that he is a
  good man? Moreover, though he is such a serious man and my senior, he
  comes to see a youngster like me and treats me as his equal." And I
  learned a great deal that was profitable from him, for he was a man of
  lofty mind.
  
  "That life is heaven," he said to me suddenly, "that I have long been
  thinking about"; and all at once he added, "I think of nothing else
  indeed." He looked at me and smiled. "I am more convinced of it than you
  are, I will tell you later why."
  
  I listened to him and thought that he evidently wanted to tell me
  something.
  
  "Heaven," he went on, "lies hidden within all of us--here it lies hidden in
  me now, and if I will it, it will be revealed to me to-morrow and for all
  time."
  
  I looked at him; he was speaking with great emotion and gazing
  mysteriously at me, as if he were questioning me.
  
  "And that we are all responsible to all for all, apart from our own sins,
  you were quite right in thinking that, and it is wonderful how you could
  comprehend it in all its significance at once. And in very truth, so soon
  as men understand that, the Kingdom of Heaven will be for them not a
  dream, but a living reality."
  
  "And when," I cried out to him bitterly, "when will that come to pass? and
  will it ever come to pass? Is not it simply a dream of ours?"
  
  "What then, you don't believe it," he said. "You preach it and don't
  believe it yourself. Believe me, this dream, as you call it, will come to
  pass without doubt; it will come, but not now, for every process has its
  law. It's a spiritual, psychological process. To transform the world, to
  recreate it afresh, men must turn into another path psychologically. Until
  you have become really, in actual fact, a brother to every one,
  brotherhood will not come to pass. No sort of scientific teaching, no kind
  of common interest, will ever teach men to share property and privileges
  with equal consideration for all. Every one will think his share too small
  and they will be always envying, complaining and attacking one another.
  You ask when it will come to pass; it will come to pass, but first we have
  to go through the period of isolation."
  
  "What do you mean by isolation?" I asked him.
  
  "Why, the isolation that prevails everywhere, above all in our age--it has
  not fully developed, it has not reached its limit yet. For every one
  strives to keep his individuality as apart as possible, wishes to secure
  the greatest possible fullness of life for himself; but meantime all his
  efforts result not in attaining fullness of life but self-destruction, for
  instead of self-realization he ends by arriving at complete solitude. All
  mankind in our age have split up into units, they all keep apart, each in
  his own groove; each one holds aloof, hides himself and hides what he has,
  from the rest, and he ends by being repelled by others and repelling them.
  He heaps up riches by himself and thinks, 'How strong I am now and how
  secure,' and in his madness he does not understand that the more he heaps
  up, the more he sinks into self-destructive impotence. For he is
  accustomed to rely upon himself alone and to cut himself off from the
  whole; he has trained himself not to believe in the help of others, in men
  and in humanity, and only trembles for fear he should lose his money and
  the privileges that he has won for himself. Everywhere in these days men
  have, in their mockery, ceased to understand that the true security is to
  be found in social solidarity rather than in isolated individual effort.
  But this terrible individualism must inevitably have an end, and all will
  suddenly understand how unnaturally they are separated from one another.
  It will be the spirit of the time, and people will marvel that they have
  sat so long in darkness without seeing the light. And then the sign of the
  Son of Man will be seen in the heavens.... But, until then, we must keep
  the banner flying. Sometimes even if he has to do it alone, and his
  conduct seems to be crazy, a man must set an example, and so draw men's
  souls out of their solitude, and spur them to some act of brotherly love,
  that the great idea may not die."
  
  Our evenings, one after another, were spent in such stirring and fervent
  talk. I gave up society and visited my neighbors much less frequently.
  Besides, my vogue was somewhat over. I say this, not as blame, for they
  still loved me and treated me good-humoredly, but there's no denying that
  fashion is a great power in society. I began to regard my mysterious
  visitor with admiration, for besides enjoying his intelligence, I began to
  perceive that he was brooding over some plan in his heart, and was
  preparing himself perhaps for a great deed. Perhaps he liked my not
  showing curiosity about his secret, not seeking to discover it by direct
  question nor by insinuation. But I noticed at last, that he seemed to show
  signs of wanting to tell me something. This had become quite evident,
  indeed, about a month after he first began to visit me.
  
  "Do you know," he said to me once, "that people are very inquisitive about
  us in the town and wonder why I come to see you so often. But let them
  wonder, for _soon all will be explained_."
  
  Sometimes an extraordinary agitation would come over him, and almost
  always on such occasions he would get up and go away. Sometimes he would
  fix a long piercing look upon me, and I thought, "He will say something
  directly now." But he would suddenly begin talking of something ordinary
  and familiar. He often complained of headache too.
  
  One day, quite unexpectedly indeed, after he had been talking with great
  fervor a long time, I saw him suddenly turn pale, and his face worked
  convulsively, while he stared persistently at me.
  
  "What's the matter?" I said; "do you feel ill?"--he had just been
  complaining of headache.
  
  "I ... do you know ... I murdered some one."
  
  He said this and smiled with a face as white as chalk. "Why is it he is
  smiling?" The thought flashed through my mind before I realized anything
  else. I too turned pale.
  
  "What are you saying?" I cried.
  
  "You see," he said, with a pale smile, "how much it has cost me to say the
  first word. Now I have said it, I feel I've taken the first step and shall
  go on."
  
  For a long while I could not believe him, and I did not believe him at
  that time, but only after he had been to see me three days running and
  told me all about it. I thought he was mad, but ended by being convinced,
  to my great grief and amazement. His crime was a great and terrible one.
  
  Fourteen years before, he had murdered the widow of a landowner, a wealthy
  and handsome young woman who had a house in our town. He fell passionately
  in love with her, declared his feeling and tried to persuade her to marry
  him. But she had already given her heart to another man, an officer of
  noble birth and high rank in the service, who was at that time away at the
  front, though she was expecting him soon to return. She refused his offer
  and begged him not to come and see her. After he had ceased to visit her,
  he took advantage of his knowledge of the house to enter at night through
  the garden by the roof, at great risk of discovery. But, as often happens,
  a crime committed with extraordinary audacity is more successful than
  others.
  
  Entering the garret through the skylight, he went down the ladder, knowing
  that the door at the bottom of it was sometimes, through the negligence of
  the servants, left unlocked. He hoped to find it so, and so it was. He
  made his way in the dark to her bedroom, where a light was burning. As
  though on purpose, both her maids had gone off to a birthday-party in the
  same street, without asking leave. The other servants slept in the
  servants' quarters or in the kitchen on the ground-floor. His passion
  flamed up at the sight of her asleep, and then vindictive, jealous anger
  took possession of his heart, and like a drunken man, beside himself, he
  thrust a knife into her heart, so that she did not even cry out. Then with
  devilish and criminal cunning he contrived that suspicion should fall on
  the servants. He was so base as to take her purse, to open her chest with
  keys from under her pillow, and to take some things from it, doing it all
  as it might have been done by an ignorant servant, leaving valuable papers
  and taking only money. He took some of the larger gold things, but left
  smaller articles that were ten times as valuable. He took with him, too,
  some things for himself as remembrances, but of that later. Having done
  this awful deed, he returned by the way he had come.
  
  Neither the next day, when the alarm was raised, nor at any time after in
  his life, did any one dream of suspecting that he was the criminal. No one
  indeed knew of his love for her, for he was always reserved and silent and
  had no friend to whom he would have opened his heart. He was looked upon
  simply as an acquaintance, and not a very intimate one, of the murdered
  woman, as for the previous fortnight he had not even visited her. A serf
  of hers called Pyotr was at once suspected, and every circumstance
  confirmed the suspicion. The man knew--indeed his mistress did not conceal
  the fact--that having to send one of her serfs as a recruit she had decided
  to send him, as he had no relations and his conduct was unsatisfactory.
  People had heard him angrily threatening to murder her when he was drunk
  in a tavern. Two days before her death, he had run away, staying no one
  knew where in the town. The day after the murder, he was found on the road
  leading out of the town, dead drunk, with a knife in his pocket, and his
  right hand happened to be stained with blood. He declared that his nose
  had been bleeding, but no one believed him. The maids confessed that they
  had gone to a party and that the street-door had been left open till they
  returned. And a number of similar details came to light, throwing
  suspicion on the innocent servant.
  
  They arrested him, and he was tried for the murder; but a week after the
  arrest, the prisoner fell sick of a fever and died unconscious in the
  hospital. There the matter ended and the judges and the authorities and
  every one in the town remained convinced that the crime had been committed
  by no one but the servant who had died in the hospital. And after that the
  punishment began.
  
  My mysterious visitor, now my friend, told me that at first he was not in
  the least troubled by pangs of conscience. He was miserable a long time,
  but not for that reason; only from regret that he had killed the woman he
  loved, that she was no more, that in killing her he had killed his love,
  while the fire of passion was still in his veins. But of the innocent
  blood he had shed, of the murder of a fellow creature, he scarcely
  thought. The thought that his victim might have become the wife of another
  man was insupportable to him, and so, for a long time, he was convinced in
  his conscience that he could not have acted otherwise.
  
  At first he was worried at the arrest of the servant, but his illness and
  death soon set his mind at rest, for the man's death was apparently (so he
  reflected at the time) not owing to his arrest or his fright, but a chill
  he had taken on the day he ran away, when he had lain all night dead drunk
  on the damp ground. The theft of the money and other things troubled him
  little, for he argued that the theft had not been committed for gain but
  to avert suspicion. The sum stolen was small, and he shortly afterwards
  subscribed the whole of it, and much more, towards the funds for
  maintaining an almshouse in the town. He did this on purpose to set his
  conscience at rest about the theft, and it's a remarkable fact that for a
  long time he really was at peace--he told me this himself. He entered then
  upon a career of great activity in the service, volunteered for a
  difficult and laborious duty, which occupied him two years, and being a
  man of strong will almost forgot the past. Whenever he recalled it, he
  tried not to think of it at all. He became active in philanthropy too,
  founded and helped to maintain many institutions in the town, did a good
  deal in the two capitals, and in both Moscow and Petersburg was elected a
  member of philanthropic societies.
  
  At last, however, he began brooding over the past, and the strain of it
  was too much for him. Then he was attracted by a fine and intelligent girl
  and soon after married her, hoping that marriage would dispel his lonely
  depression, and that by entering on a new life and scrupulously doing his
  duty to his wife and children, he would escape from old memories
  altogether. But the very opposite of what he expected happened. He began,
  even in the first month of his marriage, to be continually fretted by the
  thought, "My wife loves me--but what if she knew?" When she first told him
  that she would soon bear him a child, he was troubled. "I am giving life,
  but I have taken life." Children came. "How dare I love them, teach and
  educate them, how can I talk to them of virtue? I have shed blood." They
  were splendid children, he longed to caress them; "and I can't look at
  their innocent candid faces, I am unworthy."
  
  At last he began to be bitterly and ominously haunted by the blood of his
  murdered victim, by the young life he had destroyed, by the blood that
  cried out for vengeance. He had begun to have awful dreams. But, being a
  man of fortitude, he bore his suffering a long time, thinking: "I shall
  expiate everything by this secret agony." But that hope, too, was vain;
  the longer it went on, the more intense was his suffering.
  
  He was respected in society for his active benevolence, though every one
  was overawed by his stern and gloomy character. But the more he was
  respected, the more intolerable it was for him. He confessed to me that he
  had thoughts of killing himself. But he began to be haunted by another
  idea--an idea which he had at first regarded as impossible and unthinkable,
  though at last it got such a hold on his heart that he could not shake it
  off. He dreamed of rising up, going out and confessing in the face of all
  men that he had committed murder. For three years this dream had pursued
  him, haunting him in different forms. At last he believed with his whole
  heart that if he confessed his crime, he would heal his soul and would be
  at peace for ever. But this belief filled his heart with terror, for how
  could he carry it out? And then came what happened at my duel.
  
  "Looking at you, I have made up my mind."
  
  I looked at him.
  
  "Is it possible," I cried, clasping my hands, "that such a trivial
  incident could give rise to such a resolution in you?"
  
  "My resolution has been growing for the last three years," he answered,
  "and your story only gave the last touch to it. Looking at you, I
  reproached myself and envied you." He said this to me almost sullenly.
  
  "But you won't be believed," I observed; "it's fourteen years ago."
  
  "I have proofs, great proofs. I shall show them."
  
  Then I cried and kissed him.
  
  "Tell me one thing, one thing," he said (as though it all depended upon
  me), "my wife, my children! My wife may die of grief, and though my
  children won't lose their rank and property, they'll be a convict's
  children and for ever! And what a memory, what a memory of me I shall
  leave in their hearts!"
  
  I said nothing.
  
  "And to part from them, to leave them for ever? It's for ever, you know,
  for ever!"
  
  I sat still and repeated a silent prayer. I got up at last, I felt afraid.
  
  "Well?" He looked at me.
  
  "Go!" said I, "confess. Everything passes, only the truth remains. Your
  children will understand, when they grow up, the nobility of your
  resolution."
  
  He left me that time as though he had made up his mind. Yet for more than
  a fortnight afterwards, he came to me every evening, still preparing
  himself, still unable to bring himself to the point. He made my heart
  ache. One day he would come determined and say fervently:
  
  "I know it will be heaven for me, heaven, the moment I confess. Fourteen
  years I've been in hell. I want to suffer. I will take my punishment and
  begin to live. You can pass through the world doing wrong, but there's no
  turning back. Now I dare not love my neighbor nor even my own children.
  Good God, my children will understand, perhaps, what my punishment has
  cost me and will not condemn me! God is not in strength but in truth."
  
  "All will understand your sacrifice," I said to him, "if not at once, they
  will understand later; for you have served truth, the higher truth, not of
  the earth."
  
  And he would go away seeming comforted, but next day he would come again,
  bitter, pale, sarcastic.
  
  "Every time I come to you, you look at me so inquisitively as though to
  say, 'He has still not confessed!' Wait a bit, don't despise me too much.
  It's not such an easy thing to do, as you would think. Perhaps I shall not
  do it at all. You won't go and inform against me then, will you?"
  
  And far from looking at him with indiscreet curiosity, I was afraid to
  look at him at all. I was quite ill from anxiety, and my heart was full of
  tears. I could not sleep at night.
  
  "I have just come from my wife," he went on. "Do you understand what the
  word 'wife' means? When I went out, the children called to me, 'Good-by,
  father, make haste back to read _The Children's Magazine_ with us.' No,
  you don't understand that! No one is wise from another man's woe."
  
  His eyes were glittering, his lips were twitching. Suddenly he struck the
  table with his fist so that everything on it danced--it was the first time
  he had done such a thing, he was such a mild man.
  
  "But need I?" he exclaimed, "must I? No one has been condemned, no one has
  been sent to Siberia in my place, the man died of fever. And I've been
  punished by my sufferings for the blood I shed. And I shan't be believed,
  they won't believe my proofs. Need I confess, need I? I am ready to go on
  suffering all my life for the blood I have shed, if only my wife and
  children may be spared. Will it be just to ruin them with me? Aren't we
  making a mistake? What is right in this case? And will people recognize
  it, will they appreciate it, will they respect it?"
  
  "Good Lord!" I thought to myself, "he is thinking of other people's
  respect at such a moment!" And I felt so sorry for him then, that I
  believe I would have shared his fate if it could have comforted him. I saw
  he was beside himself. I was aghast, realizing with my heart as well as my
  mind what such a resolution meant.
  
  "Decide my fate!" he exclaimed again.
  
  "Go and confess," I whispered to him. My voice failed me, but I whispered
  it firmly. I took up the New Testament from the table, the Russian
  translation, and showed him the Gospel of St. John, chapter xii. verse 24:
  
  "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the
  ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much
  fruit."
  
  I had just been reading that verse when he came in. He read it.
  
  "That's true," he said, but he smiled bitterly. "It's terrible the things
  you find in those books," he said, after a pause. "It's easy enough to
  thrust them upon one. And who wrote them? Can they have been written by
  men?"
  
  "The Holy Spirit wrote them," said I.
  
  "It's easy for you to prate," he smiled again, this time almost with
  hatred.
  
  I took the book again, opened it in another place and showed him the
  Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter x. verse 31. He read:
  
  "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."
  
  He read it and simply flung down the book. He was trembling all over.
  
  "An awful text," he said. "There's no denying you've picked out fitting
  ones." He rose from the chair. "Well!" he said, "good-by, perhaps I shan't
  come again ... we shall meet in heaven. So I have been for fourteen years
  'in the hands of the living God,' that's how one must think of those
  fourteen years. To-morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go."
  
  I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did not dare--his face
  was contorted and somber. He went away.
  
  "Good God," I thought, "what has he gone to face!" I fell on my knees
  before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift
  defender and helper. I was half an hour praying in tears, and it was late,
  about midnight. Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again. I was
  surprised.
  
  "Where have you been?" I asked him.
  
  "I think," he said, "I've forgotten something ... my handkerchief, I
  think.... Well, even if I've not forgotten anything, let me stay a
  little."
  
  He sat down. I stood over him.
  
  "You sit down, too," said he.
  
  I sat down. We sat still for two minutes; he looked intently at me and
  suddenly smiled--I remembered that--then he got up, embraced me warmly and
  kissed me.
  
  "Remember," he said, "how I came to you a second time. Do you hear,
  remember it!"
  
  And he went out.
  
  "To-morrow," I thought.
  
  And so it was. I did not know that evening that the next day was his
  birthday. I had not been out for the last few days, so I had no chance of
  hearing it from any one. On that day he always had a great gathering,
  every one in the town went to it. It was the same this time. After dinner
  he walked into the middle of the room, with a paper in his hand--a formal
  declaration to the chief of his department who was present. This
  declaration he read aloud to the whole assembly. It contained a full
  account of the crime, in every detail.
  
  "I cut myself off from men as a monster. God has visited me," he said in
  conclusion. "I want to suffer for my sin!"
  
  Then he brought out and laid on the table all the things he had been
  keeping for fourteen years, that he thought would prove his crime, the
  jewels belonging to the murdered woman which he had stolen to divert
  suspicion, a cross and a locket taken from her neck with a portrait of her
  betrothed in the locket, her notebook and two letters; one from her
  betrothed, telling her that he would soon be with her, and her unfinished
  answer left on the table to be sent off next day. He carried off these two
  letters--what for? Why had he kept them for fourteen years afterwards
  instead of destroying them as evidence against him?
  
  And this is what happened: every one was amazed and horrified, every one
  refused to believe it and thought that he was deranged, though all
  listened with intense curiosity. A few days later it was fully decided and
  agreed in every house that the unhappy man was mad. The legal authorities
  could not refuse to take the case up, but they too dropped it. Though the
  trinkets and letters made them ponder, they decided that even if they did
  turn out to be authentic, no charge could be based on those alone.
  Besides, she might have given him those things as a friend, or asked him
  to take care of them for her. I heard afterwards, however, that the
  genuineness of the things was proved by the friends and relations of the
  murdered woman, and that there was no doubt about them. Yet nothing was
  destined to come of it, after all.
  
  Five days later, all had heard that he was ill and that his life was in
  danger. The nature of his illness I can't explain, they said it was an
  affection of the heart. But it became known that the doctors had been
  induced by his wife to investigate his mental condition also, and had come
  to the conclusion that it was a case of insanity. I betrayed nothing,
  though people ran to question me. But when I wanted to visit him, I was
  for a long while forbidden to do so, above all by his wife.
  
  "It's you who have caused his illness," she said to me; "he was always
  gloomy, but for the last year people noticed that he was peculiarly
  excited and did strange things, and now you have been the ruin of him.
  Your preaching has brought him to this; for the last month he was always
  with you."
  
  Indeed, not only his wife but the whole town were down upon me and blamed
  me. "It's all your doing," they said. I was silent and indeed rejoiced at
  heart, for I saw plainly God's mercy to the man who had turned against
  himself and punished himself. I could not believe in his insanity.
  
  They let me see him at last, he insisted upon saying good-by to me. I went
  in to him and saw at once, that not only his days, but his hours were
  numbered. He was weak, yellow, his hands trembled, he gasped for breath,
  but his face was full of tender and happy feeling.
  
  "It is done!" he said. "I've long been yearning to see you, why didn't you
  come?"
  
  I did not tell him that they would not let me see him.
  
  "God has had pity on me and is calling me to Himself. I know I am dying,
  but I feel joy and peace for the first time after so many years. There was
  heaven in my heart from the moment I had done what I had to do. Now I dare
  to love my children and to kiss them. Neither my wife nor the judges, nor
  any one has believed it. My children will never believe it either. I see
  in that God's mercy to them. I shall die, and my name will be without a
  stain for them. And now I feel God near, my heart rejoices as in Heaven
  ... I have done my duty."
  
  He could not speak, he gasped for breath, he pressed my hand warmly,
  looking fervently at me. We did not talk for long, his wife kept peeping
  in at us. But he had time to whisper to me:
  
  "Do you remember how I came back to you that second time, at midnight? I
  told you to remember it. You know what I came back for? I came to kill
  you!"
  
  I started.
  
  "I went out from you then into the darkness, I wandered about the streets,
  struggling with myself. And suddenly I hated you so that I could hardly
  bear it. Now, I thought, he is all that binds me, and he is my judge. I
  can't refuse to face my punishment to-morrow, for he knows all. It was not
  that I was afraid you would betray me (I never even thought of that), but
  I thought, 'How can I look him in the face if I don't confess?' And if you
  had been at the other end of the earth, but alive, it would have been all
  the same, the thought was unendurable that you were alive knowing
  everything and condemning me. I hated you as though you were the cause, as
  though you were to blame for everything. I came back to you then,
  remembering that you had a dagger lying on your table. I sat down and
  asked you to sit down, and for a whole minute I pondered. If I had killed
  you, I should have been ruined by that murder even if I had not confessed
  the other. But I didn't think about that at all, and I didn't want to
  think of it at that moment. I only hated you and longed to revenge myself
  on you for everything. The Lord vanquished the devil in my heart. But let
  me tell you, you were never nearer death."
  
  A week later he died. The whole town followed him to the grave. The chief
  priest made a speech full of feeling. All lamented the terrible illness
  that had cut short his days. But all the town was up in arms against me
  after the funeral, and people even refused to see me. Some, at first a few
  and afterwards more, began indeed to believe in the truth of his story,
  and they visited me and questioned me with great interest and eagerness,
  for man loves to see the downfall and disgrace of the righteous. But I
  held my tongue, and very shortly after, I left the town, and five months
  later by God's grace I entered upon the safe and blessed path, praising
  the unseen finger which had guided me so clearly to it. But I remember in
  my prayer to this day, the servant of God, Mihail, who suffered so
  greatly.
  
  
  
  
  
feat_summary_name: book 6, Chapter 2
target: From the Life of the Hieromonk and Elder Zosima, Departed in God, Composed from His Own Words by Alexei Fyodorovich Karamazov Zosima says that he holds Alyosha very dear to his heart because Alyosha reminds him of his older brother, who was a great spiritual influence on him. Zosima's brother was a critic of religion until he came down with consumption at the age of seventeen, at which point he underwent a powerful spiritual change. In the months before he died, he talked continually about loving God's creation and all living things. Zosima says that, in addition to his brother, the greatest influence on his life has been the Bible. But he did not discover the Bible until he was a grown man. In fact, he was a military officer, rather like Dmitri. When the woman Zosima loved married another man, Zosima challenged him to a duel and planned to kill him. But when he woke up on the morning of the duel, he saw the beauty of the world and remembered his brother's commandment to love all living things. He did not back out of the duel, however. Instead, he allowed the other man to take the first shot, and then fell to his knees and began to beg for his forgiveness. Zosima quickly left the army and decided to become a monk. Zosima tells of one night in the past when he received a mysterious visitor, a prominent philanthropist. After asking Zosima about his conversion, and after paying him several more visits, the philanthropist confesses a great crime. He says that he once killed a woman he loved, and another man was arrested for the crime. The man who was arrested died before his trial, and the philanthropist was free. But he tells Zosima that, despite his success in life and his loving family, he has never been satisfied, because he has always longed to make a confession. Zosima encourages him to confess to the people, and after a great deal of soul-searching, the man agrees. He holds a huge birthday party, and, in front of all his guests, reads a statement of guilt. But no one believes him. It is decided that he has gone mad. Soon after, the man falls ill, and Zosima visits him at his deathbed. There, the man tells Zosima that he almost killed Zosima after he confessed his crime. But God, he says, defeated the devil in his heart. A week later, the man died, and Zosima has kept his secret until now