XI

As soon as she arrived in Rome, Irene sent for Gzhatski.

“Are you not ashamed of yourself?” she asked him reproachfully, “for

having given me such a horrible book? What was your object? Of what

benefit could such a book be to anybody?”

“I only wanted to open your eyes to convent life,” he answered, “you

seemed to know nothing but its outer, or decorative side, so I thought I

would show you what is hidden under that charming exterior.”

“But Saint Amulfia lived in the seventeenth century! Surely everything

has changed since then?” protested Irene weakly.

“Not in convents!” replied Gzhatski with emphasis. “Nothing can ever

change where the very fundamental conditions are abnormal. Human

beings were created to live in the world, to work together, to be happy

together, and thankfully to accept and enjoy all that life can give. Only

in complying with these conditions can they retain their moral and mental

equilibrium. The moment they leave the world and become possessed by some

monomania, such as the saving of their own souls, they are unbalanced,

and there soon follow all the hallucinations, visions, temptations of

the devil, and what not, so common in convents. Convents are now being

closed in France, not, as is popularly supposed, through the influence

of Freemasons, but by science and enlightenment, two forces that always

hold high their torch in France, and always have the last word. No one

doubts that in their time convents were of great use to humanity. With

the exception of the comparatively rare cases in which inexperienced

souls were forcibly or artificially lured into taking the veil and so

ruining their healthy, normal natures, most of the people who became nuns

were such as felt the renunciation of normal life to be their vocation,

in other words, entirely unbalanced characters. Convents, therefore,

rendered an enormous service to society by imprisoning within their walls

erotic and hysterical women, and all sorts of maniacs, whose presence in

the world might have been highly detrimental to their fellows. Whenever

some sort of power fell accidentally into their hands, they managed to do

harm even after having renounced life. One need only take the one great

instance of the Spanish Inquisition, and of all the subtle refinement

of torture in which, during its sway, the cruel voluptuousness of these

diseased natures found its outlet.

“Science tells us that rest and silence and a regular life, free from all

disquieting influences, work wonders for sufferers from nervous diseases.

In monasteries and convents, such patients were not only kept, but they

also underwent cures, for in addition to everything else, these religious

institutions were generally situated amid the loveliest and healthiest

natural surroundings, and almost all the modern German and Swiss

sanatoria and ‘Rest or Air Cure’ Establishments have been built on or

near the ruins of some ancient monastery or convent. The founders of the

latter well knew with what kind of subjects they would have to deal, and

what exactly these subjects needed. I repeat: Monasteries and convents

have in the past rendered humanity a great service, by taking the place

of asylums and sanatoria for mental and nervous sufferers. Now that

institutions for the cure or care of such sufferers abound everywhere,

convents have become useless, and are being suppressed.

“In Russia, they still exist, and will long continue to exist and be

needed, because they provide for our peasantry that change and relaxation

which the upper classes find in their travels abroad. A certain amount

of change is essential to all human beings, but most particularly to

inhabitants of the gloomy North, with its cold cheerless climate. The

English, for instance, have long ago realized that it is necessary for

the maintenance of their health and strength to travel at least once a

year. Whither would our Russian peasant and his hapless ‘old woman’

betake themselves, if there existed no monastery where one can go for a

‘prayer week’? For them, convents represent the new places, new people,

new impressions, which are so necessary for jaded nerves, and which have

such a reviving influence on body and soul. Our monasteries are perfectly

aware of this, and willingly receive, feed, and maintain pilgrim

visitors. The most hospitable of all is, perhaps, the Valamski Monastery,

and our silly Petrograd does not even suspect how much of its moral and

mental good health it owes to this institution. While various charitable

societies are only just beginning to organize picnics and excursions,

the Valamski Brothers have long had their own private steamers, which,

modestly and without any advertisement or flourish of trumpets, bring

visitors to Valam, at a fare cheap enough to be within the means of the

most limited purse. Once there, all travellers are received alike by the

monks, with kindness and courtesy, are regaled with simple, wholesome

food, and provided with distractions in the shape of rowing and sailing.

How many delightful impressions have been brought back from these

excursions by the poor of Petrograd, during those glorious summer months,

when all nature rejoices! But for the Valamski Monastery, many a puny

Petrograd slum child would never have known how beautiful God’s world is.

All honour to the modest brotherhood of Valam! These are true Christians,

since they share with others God’s most glorious gift to man—nature!

“Russian monasteries also render a service to the people by their

beautiful singing. The desire for music is not, as many people wrongly

suppose, the privilege of the cultured circles. There are indeed many

clever and well-educated people who do not care about music at all, while

there are ignorant peasants who delight in it. You have only to go to

the big Cathedral of the Alexander-Nevsky Lavra, at Christmas or Easter.

At no concert will you see such beaming, happy faces. The people will

stand for two or three hours, forgetting everything in the world but the

delight of the soft dulcet tones of the choir.

“In all poor countries, where general culture is not very advanced,

monasteries give to the masses the silence, poetry and music, for which

their souls unconsciously yearn. As soon, however, as a people grows

prosperous, educates itself and finds its own distractions, the need for

convents or monasteries disappears. Simple-minded folk imagine that the

suppression of the religious orders means the decay of Christianity—but

they forget that monasteries existed in India and in China, long

before the birth of Christ. Christianity did not invent them, but the

monasteries of the time gradually adopted the new faith. Actually, all

such institutions are quite contrary to Christian ideals, for Christ’s

teaching, above all else, enjoins activity. Much more in conformity with

the Gospel are the modern religious working associations, with their

hospitals, schools, and refuges, which are springing up everywhere now

in place of the old convents. Their introduction into modern life is

perfectly comprehensible. In addition to the nervous wrecks, there

were also some healthy people who used to enter convents; people,

indeed, whose superior spiritual health, so to speak, prompted them to

consider the happiness of others, before their own. Such monks and nuns

as these were not content to do nothing but fast and pray, but invented

occupations for themselves. Some founded schools and colleges, others

nursed the sick, others again became missionaries in foreign lands. They

wore the prescribed attire of their orders, but in all other respects

they lived in the world as before, loving and helping their neighbours,

and sharing the interests and joys and sorrows of their fellow-creatures.

It is this healthy class of monastics, that is now, after the suppression

of the old institutions, hastening to found new ones, more in keeping

with the needs of our times. Such charitable associations have sprung up

in large numbers also in Russia—God speed them! But institutions of that

kind will never attract people like you, Irene Pavlovna!”

“Why not?”

“Because you are _ill_, and your illness makes the old convents, with

their mysticism and their mysteries and their sleeping existence

somewhere between earth and heaven, far more attractive to you.”

“But what is this disease?” asked Irene, with a mistrustful smile.

“The disease from which you are suffering is disgust for all activity

and contempt for all mankind. This disease usually attacks the children

or grand-children of writers, scientists, artists, sometimes also of

State officials, the kind that have spent all their lives in pouring over

State archives or other papers. Their mental overwork, at the expense

of physical strength, leaves indelible traces, and has to be paid for

by their children, who always have morbid desires for some fantastic

existence invented by their own imaginations, and find real life dull

and colourless. As soon as they are over the borders of childhood, they

begin, like ancient Israel, to dispute and struggle with God. They refuse

to accept the humanity He has created, with all its faults and failings;

they invent their own fanciful heroes, and demand of God that He should

give these imaginary creatures life. It is principally women in whom this

morbid contempt for human nature manifests itself. The girl, indeed, is

rare who does not, on getting married, attempt to remodel her husband

according to her own ideas. She tries to turn a passionate worldling

into a monk, prepares to metamorphose a pensive lover of solitude into a

brilliant society dandy, or forces a pleasure-loving social lion into the

narrow circle of her domestic interests. And the poor deluded creature

never for a moment doubts the success of her efforts. ‘I shall only have

to be insistent, and to give him no peace,’ she thinks, ‘and all will be

as I wish.’

“Some women, indeed, shatter their happiness in this way, and to the end

of their lives never realize their mistake. Of course, this ridiculous

feature of their characters proves the profound depths of ignorance

in which women are still groping, in spite of their superficial, if

sometimes apparently brilliant, intellectual attainments. Were their

mental development less shallow, they would understand that God cannot

for their pleasure entirely remodel a completed creation. This seems,

indeed, a very simple fact, but it is surprising how few women can grasp

it. Most of my morbid types try to escape from the prose of life by means

of operas, novels, dreams, and in this way they only broaden the gulf

that separates them from their more reasonable fellow-creatures. They

feel that happiness is their birthright, and they torment themselves

because they cannot attain it. Time passes, and brings disillusionment,

since the world refuses to conform itself to vain fancies. And then

begins the quarrel with God.

“‘Send me a man after my own heart,’ cry the poor deluded ones to the

Almighty, often with bitter tears. ‘Then I shall be happy, will believe

in Thy might, and will bless and praise Thy name. I despise the low,

sinful people by whom I am surrounded, and I suffer through this very

fact. I long to bow my head before some nobler being, some man who has

only virtues, and to whom I could all my life look up in adoration.’

“What answer can God give to such prayers, however sincere and agonized

they may be? They remain ungranted, and little by little they turn into

murmurs, discontent, and finally, unbelief.

“‘Were there a God,’ think these unfortunates, with a burning sense of

injustice, ‘He would pay attention to my sufferings. Once He remains

silent, this proves that He does not exist.’

“The only result is a wrecked life, void of happiness, and without

benefit to anybody.

“Such diseased characters ought to be treated and cured in childhood.

Their interest in life should be artificially educated. Novels and

operas should be strictly forbidden. They should be taught history and

medical science, and they should be made to work in hospitals, in order

to overcome that unnatural disgust for mere physical life, which is one

of their chief characteristics. They should be trained to observe their

surroundings, even to express in writing their impressions of people

with whom they come in contact, and to make logical deductions on the

subject of the probable futures of these people. In a word, to attach

these sick creatures to earth, one must convince them that there exists

nothing so interesting as humanity. Only when observation and interest in

their fellow-creatures becomes a habit, will they understand the object

of life. Instead of contempt, their hearts will be filled with profound

pity. It is themselves, indeed, that one cannot at present regard without

pity, these hapless sufferers from a deep-seated moral disease. Rancour,

greed, envy, voluptuousness, cruelty, these are all spiritual ailments,

needing special doctors and special medicines.”

“But—” stammered Irene, “these are sins, and not diseases. You are

preaching some entirely new theory.”

“No; it only seems new to you, but it is actually as old as the hills.

Shakespeare already described, in Othello, the symptoms of the disease

of jealousy, and in Hamlet, again, he showed us a soul paralyzed by

excessive self-analysis. Read the monologue of Pouschkin’s ‘Avaricious

Knight,’ and you will agree that this is the monologue of a madman.

Compare him with Molière’s ‘Miser,’ and you will notice that both the

writers have emphasized the characteristic feature of all misers: hatred

of their children. Ask any doctor, and he will tell you that mental

patients, in almost every case, lose the capacity to love or take an

interest in their relations and friends, sometimes, indeed, manifesting a

violent animosity towards them.

“It is not, indeed, only Shakespeare, or Pushkin, or Molière, it is all

the science and literature of centuries, that has prepared the way for

this (as you call it) ‘new theory.’ In our hearts, we have already long

ago accepted it; we are only hesitating to proclaim it loudly, because

it destroys all our laws and all our religions, and the whole working of

our worn-out social machinery. We are not yet rid of the ideals of the

Middle Ages; we cannot tear ourselves away from the hell that we picture

to ourselves as clearly as did Dante, nor from the heaven that, in our

imagination, is quite as dull and colourless as that of the immortal

Florentine. But time passes, and we have reached the last days of the

Middle Ages. The New Era will begin when people will at last dare to

proclaim loudly that there are no saints and sinners, but only the sick

and the healthy. A healthy man can find heaven on earth, while a diseased

nature lives in a worse hell than any that can be invented by the most

glowing imagination. Only when we realize this, shall we understand the

Gospel. Until now, during all these nineteen centuries, we have not

understood it at all, but have preserved it, feeling instinctively that

we shall need it in time. Christ’s love for ‘sinners’ will become clear

to us, and we ourselves shall be filled with profound pity for these

sufferers. Even to-day, no one dreams of hating the insane, or being

incensed against them, or punishing them. Gradually we shall begin to

regard in the same light all malicious, immoral, envious natures, pitying

them boundlessly for being afflicted with such cruel diseases. The

teaching of Christ, hitherto but half understood, will become clear and

simple.”

“But, allow me!”—interrupted Irene. “How about murderers? Will you

expect us to pity them, too, and shed tears over their moral sufferings?”

“Undoubtedly. Murderers suffer from the most terrible of all moral

diseases, and therefore deserve quite particular attention. I don’t

know whether you have ever troubled to read accounts of the executions

of criminals. I have often done so with great interest. In France, as

soon as a man is condemned to death, he is fallen upon by a whole army

of reporters, who repeat the minutest details to the public: what the

prisoner ate, how much he drank, how he slept, and what he said. This

wild chase after a sensational line sometimes unconsciously brings to

light important facts. Recently, for instance, I read an account of the

guillotining in a provincial town of a man who had killed his father.

He had, in cold blood, cut the old man’s throat, in order to come more

quickly into his little inheritance. He was, of course, very soon

caught—these diseased creatures always are. In prison he astonished

everybody by a complete indifference to his murdered father, as well

as to his own fate. His sentence startled him for a moment, but, a

minute later, he simply and confidently told his gaolers that he hoped

to keep up his courage and his spirits to the last moment if, before

mounting the scaffold, they could give him some black coffee and some

white wine. This desire to make a show of courage before the public is

the outcome of a very primitive human impulse. The lower a man’s mental

development, the more he gives for his neighbour’s praise. Natures with

loftier aspirations set a smaller value on public opinion, being, indeed,

sometimes quite indifferent to it.

“The prisoner’s wish is granted, and having swallowed his wine and his

coffee he leaves the prison with a firm step, accompanied by a priest,

who does not for a moment leave his side. On mounting the scaffold the

murderer turns to the assembled crowd and makes a speech, in which he

declares his complete repentance and bequeaths his ill-gotten inheritance

to charities. These are of course all phrases instilled into him by the

priest for the edification of the public. The prisoner repeats them like

a parrot, still for the sake of public opinion. In his heart he does not

repent in the least, otherwise he could not have previously shown the

supreme indifference to his dead father that had so enraged his gaolers.

“At last the comedy is over. The murderer, pleased with his pose of

piety, turns round and sees the guillotine knife. Immediately, the

savage brute in him awakens. He fights, struggles, scratches, bites

and screams—he sells his life dearly. Four other savage brutes throw

themselves on him and drag him to the knife. The crowd glumly watches the

nauseating scene, and gradually disperses.

“‘The public,’ writes the simple-minded reporter, ‘was present at the

triumph of justice, but instead of joy, the prevalent impression was one

of having witnessed something incomplete and unsatisfactory.’

“What wonder, indeed! Whatever laws you may invent, whatever religions

you may propagate, human instinct always was, is, and will be, more

reliable than them all. Instinct pointed out to that crowd that a

mistake had been made. No one knew where the mistake lay, but its

disturbing presence made itself clearly felt.

“It is the same instinct that sometimes makes people act, in spite of

themselves, apparently against their convictions. I remember once being

taken to see a new prison, built according to the very latest ideas and

principles. The criminals had not yet been transferred into their new

quarters. The founder led me with pride through the enormous, lofty,

light, excellently ventilated wards, showed me the perfect sanitary

arrangements, the wash-stands, the hygienic beds, the luxurious baths,

and the kitchen with all the latest and most modern improvements.

The government had evidently built, for criminals, this magnificent

sanatorium as a reward for the crimes they had committed. Leaving our

honest little peasant to starve and freeze as he will, the powers that

be had used the money extorted from him in taxes to provide robbers

and thieves and murderers with comfortable free lodgings, including

light, warmth, excellent food and clothing! In answer to my perplexed

question, the prison inspector explained to me that the prisoner is

punished by being deprived of his liberty. What an explanation! Liberty

is dear to people who know how to profit by it. Of what use is it to

those miserable wretches who look upon vodka and cheap tobacco as life’s

greatest treasures? They can get both in prison, to say nothing of the

gayest and most congenial society! Such prisons are a mockery of justice,

and a perversion of common sense. All this and much more could be said

to the Government—but the fault-finder would be wrong. The whole kernel

of the matter lies in the fact that though we still refuse to accept

the new teaching, though we regard it with contempt and hold it up to

derision, we nevertheless instinctively already build, not prisons,

but—_sanatoria_. As usual, instinct is more far-seeing than reason or

the law. The time is not far off when prison inspectors (who have been

transferred by chance into these new sanatoria, together with all the

remaining out-of-date paraphernalia of the old institutions) will be

replaced by doctors. Then, and only then, will begin the real recovery

and redemption of society, never to be attained by the naïve isolation of

acute cases of disease, or the destruction of sick people as if they were

mad dogs.”

“But how can such cures be possible? These are surely mere dreams!”

“Why mere dreams? Much has already been done—but medicine is

unfortunately still in its infancy. The future will undoubtedly bring to

light great discoveries—means and possibilities must only be provided for

experiments. Such experiments, indeed, are already receiving attention

everywhere. Only a few days ago, for instance, I read in the papers

that an Italian professor, director of a gynæcological institution, had

announced at a congress that, according to the results of his researches,

all female criminals suffered from various severe forms of women’s

diseases. He suggested that instead of imprisonment they should undergo

cures in gynæcological hospitals. Can you imagine anything more wildly

stupid than sentencing a woman to death, or shutting her up for life in a

prison, only because she needs to undergo a surgical operation? Perhaps

one can imagine just one thing that is still more uncivilized—the idea

that she will burn for ever in hell, because at the birth of her children

she was attended by a clumsy or ignorant midwife!

“And how many such cases do we meet at every step! I remember one

of my aunts once told me how she had, in her youth, suffered from

over-sensitiveness. She always imagined that everyone was laughing at

her, that no one loved her, that she had constant reason to feel offended

and insulted. She suffered dreadfully and began to grow positively

misanthropical, hating and mistrusting everybody. Happily, chance sent

her a clever doctor, who took her in hand, and put her nerves in order.

Simultaneously with this improvement, her hysterical sensitiveness

disappeared, and now, as soon as she suspects that she is going to have

an attack of ‘being offended,’ she sends to the chemist for some bromide,

and all is well!”

“You are joking, Sergei Grigorievitch!”

“Not in the least. We could all be of great help to doctors if we would

only observe ourselves more closely. Just as people at present, when

they feel indisposed, carefully note all the symptoms of their illness,

and, in order to decide on a suitable cure, try to determine which of

their organs is attacked, even so, some day, people will carefully note

their spiritual ailments, and will treat envy, hatred, and malice just

as they now treat their liver and kidneys! You are laughing, Irene

Pavlovna. But indeed many a new view that seemed strange at first has,

after fifty or a hundred years, become generally accepted and positively

commonplace. We have, for the time being, forgotten the ancient precept

_Know thyself_; if we took it to heart, we could often be our own

doctors, for indeed we each have within ourselves an enormous power of

self-treatment. Our Christian confessions—the so-called _examens de

conscience_ of the Catholics—are nothing but minute observations of

ourselves. In former times people took communion, and therefore went to

confession, every Sunday. They were obliged, once a week, critically to

examine all their actions, and to decide which of them had been sinful

(_i.e._, not normal). Beyond this they had to talk these actions over

with their spiritual advisers, men chosen for this purpose because they

were considered worthy of respect and confidence (_i.e._, because they

were normal and healthy). Unfortunately, however, it always happens that

customs initiated by master minds for the lasting benefit of humanity,

invariably, after a time, fall into the hands of incapable mediocrities,

who do not understand the true meaning and object of the ideas in

question, and transform them into mechanical poses, from which all

sincere natures must turn away.

“A careful observation of ourselves would immensely simplify life, and

would make many things much clearer to us. You, for instance, Irene

Pavlovna, are sincerely convinced that the only reason why you never

married is the fact that you did not meet a man who was worthy of you.

Actually there was quite another reason. You simply felt a physical

disgust at thought of the realisms of marriage—the living with a man

as his wife, the bearing of children, the feeding and nursing of these

children. This prose sickened you, and as soon as someone was pleasing

or sympathetic to you, you hastened to find or invent reasons for not

marrying him. You looked for faults in him, exaggerated them, invented

them, and did all you could to assure yourself that he was unworthy of

you.

“In addition, marriage would really have meant too sudden a change for

you—since, as is the case with all invalids, even the smallest change

is a great trial for your nerves. Every trifling decision costs you

many nightmares, and is accompanied by palpitation of the heart, tears,

and nervous exhaustion. People like you bear every discomfort in their

house rather than move into another one, and submit to the tyranny of

their servants because they have not the energy to look for new ones.

It is curious that such characters arrive, with the greatest ease and

promptitude, at theoretical and abstract decisions. For instance, to take

a furnished house in the country and move into it for the summer is

frightfully difficult, but to emigrate is very easy. One only has to read

a charming description of Rome, and—good-bye, Russia! I don’t want you

any more! I am going to Italy, and shall become an Italian!”

“What nonsense you are talking, Sergei Grigorievitch! This is all bluff,

and you are simply trying to be brilliant! I assure you I have dreamt of

marriage all my life. If you only knew what touching scenes of family

life I have pictured to myself! This was always my greatest delight!”

“Oh! I quite believe that! We know how to dream beautifully! And in our

dreams we are always extraordinarily active! We cross oceans, found

colonies, introduce ideal governments, and die as Kings or at least

Presidents of Republics! In actual life, however, we groan, we are

miserable, and we greatly resent being obliged to bother about going to

the Bank, in order to receive the interest of the capital acquired for us

by our more energetic ancestors.”

“All this is untrue, and a mockery!”

“Would you like me to prove the truth of my words by an example?”

“If you like.”

“Very well. Do you consider me a career-hunter?”

“Of course not. What an idea!”

“And, in your opinion, I am an honest man worthy of respect?”

“Certainly.”

“In that case, what would you say if I asked you to be my wife?”

“Sergei Grigorievitch! What are you thinking about? I am much too old to

marry!”

“There! I have caught you at once! As soon as the word ‘marriage’ is

mentioned, you immediately find an excuse.”

“But what I say is true! If you want to marry, you must choose a young

girl who can have children.”

“And how do you know that you will have no children? Are you so well

acquainted with the decrees of the celestial chancery? Be sincere and

say that the thought of marriage disgusts you. That will be nearer the

truth.”