IX

One spring evening towards the end of March, when the snow had

disappeared and starlings sang in the hospital garden, the doctor was

standing at his gate saying good-bye to his friend the postmaster. At

that moment the Jew Moséika, returning with his booty, entered the

yard. He was capless, wore a pair of goloshes on his stockingless feet,

and held in his hand a small bag of coins.

"Give me a kopeck?" he said to the doctor, shuddering from the cold and

grinning.

Andréi Yéfimitch, who could refuse no one, gave him a ten-kopeck piece.

"How wrong this is!" he thought, as he looked at the Jew's bare legs

and thin ankles. "Wet, I suppose?" And impelled by a feeling of pity

and squeamishness he entered the wing after Moséika, looking all the

time now at the Jew's bald head, now at his ankles. When the doctor

entered, Nikita jumped off his rubbish-heap and stretched himself.

"Good evening, Nikita!" said the doctor softly. "Suppose you give this

man a pair of boots ... that is ... he might catch cold."

"Yes, your Honour. I will ask the superintendent."

"Please. Ask him in my name. Say that I spoke about it."

The door of the ward was open. Iván Dmítritch, who was lying on his

bed, and listening with alarm to the unknown voice, suddenly recognised

the doctor. He shook with anger, jumped oft his bed, and with a

flushed, malicious face, and staring eyeballs, ran into the middle of

the room.

"It is the doctor!" he cried, with a loud laugh. "At last! Lord,

I congratulate you, the doctor honours us with a visit! Accursed

monster!" he squealed, and in an ecstacy of rage never before seen in

the hospital, stamped his feet. "Kill this monster! No, killing is not

enough for him! Drown him in the closet!"

Andréi Yéfimitch heard him. He looked into the ward and asked mildly:

"For what?"

"For what!" screamed Iván Dmítritch, approaching with a threatening

face, and convulsively clutching his dressing-gown. "For what! Thief!"

He spoke in a tone of disgust, and twisted his lips as if about to spit.

"Charlatan! Hangman!"

"Be quiet!" said Andréi Yéfimitch, smiling guiltily. "I assure you I

have never stolen anything.... I see that you are angry with me. Be

calm, I implore you, if you can, and tell me why you want to kill me."

"For keeping me here."

"I do that because you are ill."

"Yes! Ill! But surely tens, hundreds, thousands of madmen live

unmolested merely because you in your ignorance cannot distinguish them

from the sane. You, the feldscher, the superintendent, all the rascals

employed in the hospital are immeasurably lower in morals than the

worst of us; why, then, are we here instead of you? Where is the logic?"

"It is not a question of morality or logic. It depends on

circumstances. The man who is put here, here he stays, and the man who

is not here lives in freedom, that is all For the fact that I am a

doctor and you a lunatic neither morals nor logic is responsible, but

only empty circumstance."

"This nonsense I do not understand!" answered Iván Dmitri tch, sitting

down on his bed.

Moséika, whom Nikita was afraid to search in the doctor's presence,

spread out on his bed his booty--pieces of bread, papers, and bones;

and trembling with the cold, talked Yiddish in a sing-song voice.

Apparently he imagined that he was opening a shop.

"Release me!" said Iván Dmítritch. His voice trembled.

"I cannot."

"Why not?"

"Because it is not in my power. Judge for yourself! What good would it

do you if I released you? Suppose I do! The townspeople or the police

will capture you and send you back."

"Yes, that is true, it is true ..." said Iván Dmítritch, rubbing his

forehead. "It is terrible! But what can I do? What?"

His voice, his intelligent, youthful face pleased Andréi Yéfimitch.

He wished to caress him and quiet him. He sat beside him on the bed,

thought for a moment, and said:

"You ask what is to be done. The best thing in your position would be

to run away. But unfortunately that is useless. You would be captured.

When society resolves to protect itself from criminals, lunatics,

and inconvenient people, it is irresistible. One thing alone remains

to you, to console yourself with the thought that your stay here is

necessary."

"It is necessary to no one."

"Once prisons and asylums exist, someone must inhabit them. If it is

not you it will be I, if not I then someone else. But wait! In the far

future there will be neither prisons nor madhouses, nor barred windows,

nor dressing-gowns.... Such a time will come sooner or later."

Iván Dmítritch smiled contemptuously.

"You are laughing at me," he said, winking. "Such gentry as you and

your assistant Nikita have no business with the future. But you may

be assured, sir, that better times are in store for us. What if I do

express myself vulgarly--laugh at me!--but the dawn of a new life

will shine, and truth will triumph ... and it will be on our side the

holiday will be. I shall not see it, but our posterity shall.... I

congratulate them with my whole soul, and rejoice--rejoice for them!

Forward! God help you, friends!"

Iván Dmítritch's eyes glittered; he rose, stretched out his eyes to the

window, and said in an agitated voice:

"For these barred windows I bless you. Hail to the truth! I rejoice!"

"I see no cause for rejoicing," said Andréi Yéfimitch, whom Iván

Dmítritch's movements, though they seemed theatrical, pleased.

"Prisons and asylums will no longer be, and justice, as you put it,

will triumph. But the essence of things will never change, the laws of

Nature will remain the same. Men will be diseased, grow old, and die,

just as now. However glorious the dawn which enlightens your life, in

the end of ends you will be nailed down in a coffin and flung into a

pit."

"But immortality?"

"Nonsense!"

"You do not believe, but I believe. Dostoyeffsky or Voltaire or someone

said that if there were no God men would have invented one. And I am

deeply convinced that if there were no immortality it would sooner or

later have been invented by the great human intellect."

"You speak well," said Andréi Yéfimitch, smiling with pleasure. "It is

well that you believe. With such faith as yours you would live happily

though entombed in a wall. May I asked where you were educated?"

"I was at college, but never graduated."

"You are a thoughtful and penetrating man. You would find tranquillity

in any environment. The free and profound thought which aspires to

the comprehension of life; and high contempt for the vanity of the

world--these are two blessings higher than which no man can know. And

these you will enjoy though you live behind a dozen barred windows.

Diogenes lived in a tub, yet he was happier than all the kings of the

earth."

"Your Diogenes was a blockhead!" cried Iván Dmítritch gloomily. "What

do you tell me about Diogenes and the understanding of life?" He spoke

angrily, and sprang up. "I love life, love it passionately. I have the

mania of persecution, a ceaseless, tormenting terror, but there are

moments when I am seized by the thirst of life, and in those moments I

fear to go out of my mind. I long to live ... terribly!"

He walked up and down the ward in agitation, and continued in a lower

voice:

"When I meditate I am visited by visions. Men come to me, I hear voices

and music, and it seems to me that I am walking through woods, on the

shores of the sea; and I long passionately for the vanities and worries

of life.... Tell me! What is the news?"

"You ask about the town, or generally?"

"First tell me about the town, and then generally?"

"What is there? The town is tiresome to the point of torment. There is

no one to talk to, no one to listen to. There are no new people. But

lately we got a new doctor, Khobótoff, a young man."

"He has been here. A fool?"

"Yes, an uneducated man. It is strange, do you know. If you judge

by metropolitan life there is no intellectual stagnation in Russia,

but genuine activity; in other words, there are real men. But for

some reason or other they always send such fellows here. It is an

unfortunate town.'"

"An unfortunate town," sighed Iván Dmítritch. "And what news is there

generally? What have you in the newspapers and reviews?"

In the ward it was already dark. The doctor rose, and told his patient

what was being written in Russia and abroad, and what were the current

tendencies of the world. Iván Dmítritch listened attentively, and

asked questions. But suddenly, as if he had just remembered something

terrible, he seized his head and threw himself on the bed, with his

back turned to the doctor.

"What is the matter?" asked Andréi Yéfimitch. "You will not hear

another word from me," said Iván Dmítritch rudely. "Go away!"

"Why?"

"I tell you, go away! Go to the devil!"

Andréi Yéfimitch shrugged his shoulders, sighed, and left the ward. As

he passed through the hall, he said: "Suppose you were to clear some of

this away; Nikita.... The smell is frightful."

"Yes, your Honour!"

"What a delightful young man!" thought Andréi Yéfimitch, as he walked

home. "He is the first man worth talking to whom I have met all the

time I have lived in this town. He can reason and interests himself

only with what is essential."

As he read in his study, as he went to bed, all the time, he thought of

Iván Dmítritch. When he awoke next morning, he remembered that he had

made the acquaintance of a clever and interesting man. And he decided

to pay him another visit at the first opportunity.

X

Iván Dmítritch lay in the same position as on the day before, holding

his head in his hands, his legs being doubled up underneath him.

"Good morning, my friend," said Andréi Yéfimitch. "You are not asleep?"

"In the first place I am not your friend," said Iván Dmítritch, keeping

his face turned towards the pillow, "and in the second, you are

troubling yourself in vain; you will not get from me a single word."

"That is strange," said Andréi Yéfimitch. "Yesterday we were speaking

as friends, but suddenly you took offence and stopped short.... Perhaps

I spoke awkwardly, or expressed opinions differing widely from your

own."

"You won't catch me!" said Iván Dmítritch, rising from the bed and

looking at the doctor ironically and suspiciously. "You may go and spy

and cross-examine somewhere else; here there is nothing for you to do.

I know very well why you came yesterday.

"That is a strange idea," laughed the doctor. "But why do you assume

that I am spying?"

"I assume it.... Whether spy or doctor it is all the same."

"Yes, but ... excuse me...." The doctor sat on a stool beside the bed,

and shook his head reproachfully. "Even suppose you are right, suppose

I am following your words only in order to betray you to the police,

what would happen? They would arrest you and try you. But then, in the

dock or in prison would you be worse off than here? In exile or penal

servitude you would not suffer any more than now.... What, then, do you

fear?"

Apparently these words affected Iván Dmítritch. He sat down quietly.

It was five o'clock, the hour when Andréi Yéfimitch usually walked up

and down his room and Dáryushka asked him whether it was time for his

beer. The weather was calm and clear.

"After dinner I went out for a walk, and you see where I've come," said

the doctor. "It is almost spring."

"What month is it?" asked Iván Dmítritch. "March?"

"Yes, we are at the end of March."

"Is it very muddy?"

"Not very. The paths in the garden are clear."

"How glorious it would be to drive somewhere outside the town!" said

Iván Dmítritch, rubbing his red eyes as if he were sleepy, "and then

to return to a warm comfortable study ... and to be cured of headache

by a decent doctor.... For years past I have not lived like a human

being.... Things are abominable here,--intolerable, disgusting!"

After last evening's excitement he was tired and weak, and he spoke

unwillingly. His fingers twitched, and from his face it was plain that

his head ached badly.

"Between a warm, comfortable study and this ward there is no

difference," said Andréi Yéfimitch. "The rest and tranquillity of a man

are not outside but within him."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Ordinary men find good and evil outside, that is, in their carriages

and comfortable rooms; but the thinking man finds them within himself."

"Go and preach that philosophy in Greece, where it is warm and smells

of oranges--it doesn't suit this climate. With whom was it I spoke of

Diogenes? With you?"

"Yes, yesterday with me."

"Diogenes had no need of a study and a warm house, he was comfortable

without them.... Lie in a tub and eat oranges and olives! Set him down

in Russia--not in December, but even in May. He would freeze even in

May with the cold."

"No. Cold, like every other feeling, may be disregarded. As Marcus

Aurelius said, pain is the living conception of pain; make an effort

of the will to change this conception, cease to complain, and the

pain disappears. The wise man, the man of thought and penetration, is

distinguished by his contempt for suffering; he is always content and

he is surprised by nothing."

"That means that I am an idiot because I suffer, because I am

discontented, and marvel at the baseness of men."

"Your discontent is in vain. Think more, and you will realise how

trifling are all the things which now excite you.... Try to understand

life--in this is true beatitude."

"Understand!" frowned Iván Dmítritch. "External, internal.... Excuse

me, but I cannot understand you. I know only one thing," he continued,

rising and looking angrily at the doctor. "I know only that God created

me of warm blood and nerves; yes! and organic tissue, if it be capable

of life, must respond to irritation. And I respond to it! Pain I

answer with tears and cries, baseness with indignation, meanness with

repulsion. In my mind, that is right, and it is that which is called

life. The lower the organism the less susceptible is it, and the more

feebly it responds to irritation; the higher it is the more sensitively

it responds. How is it you do not know that? A doctor--yet you do not

know such truisms! If you would despise suffering, be always contented,

and marvel at nothing, you must lower yourself to the condition of

that...." Iván Dmítritch pointed to the fat, greasy muzhik, "or inure

yourself to suffering until you lose all susceptibility--in other

words, cease to live. Excuse me, but I am not a wise man and not

a philosopher," continued Iván Dmítritch irritably, "and I do not

understand these things. I am not in a condition to reason."

"But you reason admirably."

"The Stoics whom you travesty were remarkable men, but their teaching

died two thousand years ago, and since then it has not advanced, nor

will it advance, an inch, for it is not a practical or a living creed.

It was successful only with a minority who spent their lives in study

and trifled with gospels of all sorts; the majority never understood

it.... A creed which teaches indifference to wealth, indifference

to the conveniences of life, and contempt for suffering, is quite

incomprehensible to the great majority who never knew either wealth

or the conveniences of life, and to whom contempt for suffering would

mean contempt for their own lives, which are made up of feelings of

hunger, cold, loss, insult, and a Hamlet-like terror of death. All life

lies in these feelings, and life may be hated or wearied of, but never

despised. Yes, I repeat it, the teaching of the Stoics can never have a

future; from the beginning of time, life has consisted in sensibility

to pain and response to irritation.[1] Iván Dmítritch suddenly lost

the thread of his thoughts, ceased speaking, and nibbed his forehead

irritably.

"I had something important to say, but have gone off the track," he

continued. "What was I saying? Yes, this is it. One of these Stoics

sold himself into slavery to redeem a friend. Now what does that mean

but that even a Stoic responded to irritation, for to perform such a

magnanimous deed as the min of one's self for the sake of a friend

demands a disturbed and sympathetic heart I have forgotten here in

prison all that I learnt, otherwise I should have oilier illustrations.

But think of Christ! Christ rebelled against actuality by weeping, by

smiling, by grieving, by anger, even by weariness. Not with a smile did

He go forth to meet suffering, nor did He despise death, but prayed in

the garden of Gethsemane that this cup might pass from Him."[2]

Iván Dmítritch laughed and sat down.

"Suppose that contentment and tranquillity are not outside but within a

man," he continued. "Suppose that we must despise suffering and marvel

at nothing. But you do not say on what foundation you base this theory.

You are a wise man? A philosopher?"

"I am not a philosopher, but everyone must preach this because it is

rational."

"But I wish to know why in this matter of understanding life, despising

suffering, and the rest of it, you consider yourself competent to

judge? Have you ever suffered? What is your idea of suffering? Were you

ever flogged when you were a child?"

"No, my parents were averse to corporal punishment."

"But my father flogged me cruelly. He was a stern hemorrhoidal official

with a long nose and a yellow neck. But what of you? In your whole

life no one has ever laid a finger on you, and you are as healthy as

a bull. You grew up under your father's wing, studied at his expense,

and then dropped at once into a fat sinecure. More than twenty years

you have lived in free lodgings, with free fire and free lights, with

servants, with the right to work how, and as much as, you like, or to

do nothing. By character you were an idle and a feeble man, and you

strove to build up your life so as to avoid trouble. You left your

work to feldschers and other scoundrels, and sat at home in warmth and

quiet, heaped up money, read books, and enjoyed your own reflections

about all kinds of exalted nonsense, and"--Iván Dmítritch looked at the

doctor's nose--"drank beer. In one word, you have not seen life, you

know nothing about it, and of realities you have only a theoretical

knowledge. Yes, you despise suffering and marvel at nothing for very

good reasons; because your theory of the vanity of things, external and

internal happiness, contempt for life, for suffering and for death,

and so on--this is the philosophy best suited to a Russian lie-abed.

You see, for instance, a muzhik beating his wife. Why interfere? let

him beat her! It is all the same, both will be dead sooner, or later,

and then, does not the wife-beater injure himself and not his victim?

To get drunk is stupid and wrong, but the man who drinks dies, and the

woman who drinks dies also! A woman comes to you with a toothache.

Well, what of that? Pain is the conception of pain, without sickness

you cannot live, all must die, and therefore take yourself off, my

good woman, and don't interfere with my thoughts and my vodka! A young

man comes to you for advice: what should he do, how ought he to live?

Before answering, most men would think, but your answer is always

ready: Aspire to understand life and to real goodness! And what is

this fantastic real goodness? No answer! We are imprisoned behind iron

bars, we rot and we are tortured, but this, in reality, is reasonable

and beautiful because between this ward and a comfortable warm study

there is no real difference! A convenient philosophy; your conscience

is clean, and you feel yourself to be a wise man. No, sir, this is

not philosophy, not breadth of view, but idleness, charlatanism,

somnolent folly.... Yes," repeated Iván Dmítritch angrily. "You despise

suffering, but squeeze your finger in the door and you will howl for

your life!"

"But suppose I do not howl," said Andréi Yéfimitch, smiling indulgently.

"What! Well, if you had a stroke of paralysis, or if some impudent

fellow, taking advantage of his position in the world, insulted you'

publicly, and you had no redress--then you would know what it meant to

tell others to understand life and aspire to real good."

"This is original," said Andréi Yéfimitch, beaming with satisfaction

and rubbing his hands. "I am delighted with your love of

generalisation; and the character which you have just drawn is simply

brilliant. I confess that conversation with you gives me great

pleasure. Rut now, as I have heard you out, will you listen to me...."