Chapter 12 one ○

These griefs and suicidal visions which Levin concealed from Kitty, Tolstoy also concealed from his wife.But he's not yet at the level of calm he bestows on his book's protagonist.Seriously speaking, peace cannot be conveyed to others.We felt that he had only wished for peace but had not achieved it, and that Levin would soon be plunged into suspicion again.Tolstoy understood this layer well.He hardly had the energy and courage to finish this book.It wears him out before it's done. "Now I am repeatedly entangled with that disgusting vulgar book, and my only hope is to get rid of it as soon as possible..." (to Fett on August 26, 1875 book) "I deserve to finish the novel which wears me out..." (to Fetter, 1876) He could no longer work.He stayed there, immobile, without will, disgusted with himself, afraid of himself.Then, in the interstices of his life, came a gust of the abyss, the dazzle of death.Tolstoy, after escaping from the abyss, spoke of these terrible years.See (1879).Complete Works Volume Nineteen.

"I was not yet fifty," he said, of which I quote in general terms, retaining only Tolstoy's tone. "I love, I am loved, I have good children, big land, glory, health, physical and mental strength; I can mow like a farmer; I can work ten hours straight without getting tired. Suddenly , my life has stopped. I can breathe, eat, drink, sleep. But this is not life. I have no desires. I know I have no desires. I do not even wish to know the truth. The so-called truth is: Life is irrational. I was then on the face of the abyss, and I evidently saw that there was nothing but death before me. I, a healthy and happy being, felt that I could no longer live. An irresistible force It drove me out of life. . . . I don't say I was going to kill myself. The force that pushed me out of life was stronger than me; it was somewhat similar to my previous vision of life, but it was the opposite. I had to strategize with myself so that I would not give way too quickly. I, happy being, had to hide the rope to keep me from hanging myself between the closets in the house. I no longer held The gun went hunting, I'm afraid it will make me excited. There is such a passage: "Levin, loved, happy, head of the family, he hid all weapons with his own hands, as if he was afraid of suicide. The temptation is average. This state of mind is not peculiar to Tolstoy and his characters. Tolstoy was surprised at the number of suicides committed in Europe, especially in Russia. Mention this. Let us say that in about 1880 there was an epidemic of mental malaise in Europe, which affected thousands. Those who were young at that time, like myself, can remember this; Tolstoy's confession of this human crisis has historical value. He wrote the tragedy of an era. I feel that my life is a prank played by someone and me. Forty years of work, pain, progress , What I saw was nothing! Nothing. In the future, I will only leave behind a pair of corroded bones and countless maggots... Only when I am intoxicated with life can I live alone; but once the intoxication disappears, I will I see nothing but deceit, false deceit...Family and art are not enough for me. Family, they are wretches like me. Art is a mirror of life. When life becomes meaningless, the game of mirrors It won't be fun anymore. The worst thing is that I can't hold back. I seem to be a man lost in the forest, extremely resentful, because he is lost, running around and can't stop himself, although he understands The more you run for one minute, the more lost you will be..." After all, his destination lies with the people.Tolstoy always had "a strange, purely physical feeling" for them.His many disillusioned experiences in society never shook his faith.In the last few years he, like Levin, had grown much closer to the people.His portraits of this era testify to his popularity.A portrait by Kramskoy (1873) shows Tolstoy in overalls, with his head bowed like a German Christ.In another portrait from 1881, he has the air of a well-dressed Sunday foreman: his hair is cropped, his beard and sideburns are disheveled; Godless, with dog-like nostrils and huge ears.He began to think that there were thousands of beings beyond his narrow circle of suicidal, self-narcotic scholars, of the rich, of the leisure classes who lived nearly as hopeless a life as he did.He asked himself why these millions of beings were spared this despair, why they didn't kill themselves.He found that they lived, not by reason, but—without regard for reason—by faith.What is this ignorant faith?

"Faith is the power of life. People cannot live without faith. Religious thoughts have been brewed and matured in the earliest human thoughts. The answer to the mystery of life given by faith contains the most profound wisdom of mankind." Is it then enough to know these formulas of wisdom enumerated in religious books? ——No, belief is not a kind of knowledge, but belief is an act; it is only meaningful when it is practiced.Ordinary "sophisticated" people and rich people regard religion as only a "comfort for enjoying life". This disgusts Tolstoy, and he decides to mix with ordinary simple people. Make life and faith fully consistent.

He understood: "The life of the working people is the body of life, and the meaning of this kind of life is the truth." But how to make oneself a people so as to enjoy his confidence?It is in vain for a man to know that others are right; it is not ourselves that makes us like them.In vain we pray to God; in vain we lean toward him with longing arms.God hides from us, where can we catch him? One day, the favor of God was obtained. "One day in early spring, I was alone in the woods, and I listened to the voices in the woods. I thought about my last three years of confusion, God's quest. The endless jumps from joy to despair...Suddenly, I saw I live only when I believe in God. When I think of God, waves of life's joy flow within me. Around me, everything comes to life, everything acquires a meaning. But until I don't believe in God Then, suddenly, my life was cut off. A cry came from within me: "--so, what else am I looking for?It is the 'he', the 'he' who cannot live without it!Knowing God and living are one thing.God is life... "From now on, this light will never leave me.".

He is saved.God had appeared before him.In fact, this is not the first time. The young volunteers in "Caucasus Chronicle", the officers in "Sevastopol", and Prince Andrew and Pierre in "Caucasus Chronicle" all had the same hallucinations.But Tolstoy was so passionate that every time he discovered God, he must have thought it was the first time when there was only night and nothingness before.In his past, he saw only shadow and shame.We know the history of his mind better than he himself because of him.We know that his heart was deeply religious even when it was lost and perplexed.Moreover, he also admitted that in the preface to "Critique of Doctrinal Theology", he wrote: "God! God! I have sought truth where I should not have sought it. I know I am wandering. I know my sexuality is not good. Yes, I flatter it; but I'll never forget you! I'll always feel you, even when I'm lost"—1878-79 The frenzy was just a madder madness than any other , perhaps because of the stimulation of population death year after year and the effect of increasing age.The only characteristic of the lesion this time was that the appearance of the gods did not dissipate after the ecstasy had passed. Tolstoy, taught by experience, hastily "forwarded as long as he grasped the moment of light" and In his faith summed up his whole outlook on life.It is not that he has never tried such experiments (we remember that he already had the concept of "the laws of life" in his college days), but that at fifty years of age there are fewer opportunities for enthusiasm to seduce him astray.

But he is not an Indian mystic, and cannot be satisfied with meditation; because his Asian fantasy is mixed with the Western character of emphasizing reason and demanding action, so he must show and express what he has obtained. Faith, practiced honestly, finds the law of daily life in the life of the gods.Without preconceptions, he studied the teachings of the Roman Orthodox Church in which he joined, in order to sincerely believe in what his family professed.This section of the Chronicle is under the following subtitle: "Introduction to the Critique of Doctrinal Theology and the Review of Christianism."And in order to get closer to this doctrine, he participated in all religious ceremonies, confessions, sacraments, and everything that made him unhappy during the three years. thing.In the belief that he and his loved ones, living or dead, are in complete agreement, always hoping that in due time "love will open the door of truth for him." —but his efforts were in vain: his reason and heart fought against each other.Some acts, such as baptism and communion, appeared to him shameless.When he was compelled to repeat that the Eucharist was the true flesh and blood of Christ, "it was as if a knife had been cut in his heart."It was not doctrine, but practice, that erected an impassable wall between him and the Church. — especially the mutual hatred among the various churches, "I, who put the truth in the estrous unit, find it strange that religion destroys itself as it would produce" (see) and whether absolute or tacit. The right to kill—from which arises both war and the death penalty.

So Tolstoy resigned; for three years his thoughts had been suppressed, so his resignation was all the more violent.He doesn't care about anything anymore.He scorned the religion he practiced the other day.In his "Critique of Doctrinal Theology" (1879-1881), he not only regards theology as "an unreasonable, but a conscious and effective lie". "I am convinced that the dogma of the Church is a pernicious lie in theory, and many vulgar and demonic superstitions in practice, in which case the meaning of Christianism is utterly extinguished." (Reply to the Holy Synod, April 4-17, 1901) See Church and State. (1883) - Tolstoy accused the church of the greatest crime, is its connection with the temporary power of the world.This is the "bond of the robber and the liar."In his On the Unity of the Gospels (1881-1883) he pitted the Gospels against theology.Finally, he established his faith in the Gospels (The Foundations of My Faith, 1883).

This belief is found in the following words: "I believe in the doctrine of Christ. I believe that happiness can only exist in the world when all people realize happiness." The basis of faith is the preaching of Moses on the Mount. Tolstoy summarized these teachings into five commandments: 1. Do not be angry. Two, do not commit adultery. Three, do not swear. 4. Don't complain with complaints. 5. Don't be an enemy. This is the negative part of the doctrine, the positive part of which consists only in one admonition: Love God and your neighbor as yourself. Christ said that the slightest transgression of these commandments will occupy the least place in the kingdom of heaven.

Tolstoy naively adds: "However strange it may appear, the discovery of these laws was a novelty to me after eighteen hundred years." So, does Tolstoy believe that Christ is a god? —I don’t believe it at all.What did he think of him?Be regarded as the highest of the sages, Shakyamuni, Brahman, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Zoroastrian, Isaiah - all who have shown man the true happiness and the only way to achieve it.The older he got, the more he believed in the unity of religions in human history, and in the parallelism between Christ and other sages—from Sakyamuni to Kant.He wrote: "Jesus' doctrine, to me, is only the most beautiful religious thought in ancient times, such as the first-rate of various thought trends such as Egypt, Judaism, India, and China. The two principles of Jesus: respect and love for God, that is, absolute perfection; The fraternity of the same kind, that is, equal treatment without distinction; these two principles have been the world's ancient sages, Sakyamuni, Laozi, Confucius, Socrates, Plato, etc., modern sages Rousseau, Pascal, Kant, love Mersen et al.” Tolstoy was the creator of these great religions—the followers of the demigods and prophets of India, China, and Hebrew.He tried to defend them.Assault on what he called "hypocrites" and "Scribes" of the first class, on established churches, on representatives of arrogant science.Tolstoy argues that he does not attack true science because it is open-minded and aware of its limits.This is not to say that he intends to overthrow reason by the manifestation of the heart.Since he had escaped from the period of boredom mentioned above, he was especially a follower of reason, an intellectual mystic, so to speak.

"Originally Verbe (the second of the Trinity)," he says with St. John, "Verbe, meaning 'reason.'" In his book "Theory of Life" (1887), he quoted Pascal's famous line in the inscription: "Man is but a reed, the weakest thing in nature, but this is a thinking reed...  All our dignity is contained in thought...so we have to think well: this is the essence of morality." Tolstoy often read Pascal's "Thoughts" when he was insane.He mentioned it in Letters to Fett. The whole book is but an ode to reason. "Reason" is certainly not a scientific reason, a narrow reason, "taking the part as the whole, and treating the life of the flesh as the whole life", but the highest law governing human life, "rational creatures, that is, human beings." , must follow the law of its life."

"This is a law similar to the law that governs the growth and reproduction of animals, the germination and prosperity of vegetation, and the movement of stars and the earth. Only in following this law, for the sake of goodness, we subject our animal nature to the rules of reason. In our deeds is our life.... Reason cannot be ascertained, and we need not be ascertained, for not only we all know it, but we only know it.... All that man knows is from the intellect—not from the Faith—knowing . . . life begins only when reason has a vindication. The only real life is the life of reason." In a letter to a certain Baron, November 26, 1894, Tolstoy also said: "Man receives directly from God, only a tool for knowing himself and contacting the world. This tool is reason, which comes from God. It is not only a noble character of human beings. , and the only means of knowing the truth.” So, what is physical life, our personal life? "It is not our life," said Tolstoy, "because it is not of our own accord." "Our bodily activities are performed outside of us... The notion of life as an individual has been annihilated among mankind today. For all rational beings in our time, the impossibility of individual good deeds has ceased to become an unmistakable truth." See Tolstoy's Biography. There are many more premises, which I will not discuss here, but which show how much Tolstoy's enthusiasm for reason is.In fact, this is a passion, the same blindness and jealousy as the passion that dominated the first half of his life.One flame goes out, another flame is lit.Or it can be said that it is always the same flame, but it has changed its nourishment. What makes the "individual" passions more like this "intellectual" passion is that none of these passions can be satisfied with love, they have to be active and fulfilled. "Should not be said, but done," said Christ. What is the phenomenon of intellectual activity? --Love. "Love is the only rational activity of human beings. Love is the most rational and brightest state of mind. It needs nothing to obscure the light of reason, for only the light of reason can encourage love.  … Love is The true good, the supreme good, resolves all the contradictions of life, and not only annihilates the terror of death, but inspires sacrifice for others: for there is no other love but the giving of life to the beloved; it alone is Love is only worthy of the name of love when it is sacrificed to itself. True love, therefore, can only be realized when man understands the impossibility of personal happiness. Only then can the essence of his life become the noble expression of true love. A graft, and for the sake of growth, this graft absorbs vitality from this crude stem, that is, the body of the flesh..." See "Biography of Tolstoy". In this way Tolstoy does not reach faith like a drained river lost in the sand.He concentrated the powerful life force and poured it into the faith. — We shall see this later. This passionate faith, which closely combines love and reason, found its full expression in Tolstoy's reply to the Holy Religious Council to excommunicate him: this religious thought must have evolved from several problems , especially since that involves the concept of future life. "I believe in God, and God to me is spirit, love, and the essence of all. I believe that he is in me as I am in him. I believe that the will of God has never been expressed more than in the teaching of Christ. Clearer; but we cannot pray to Christ as God, which would be the greatest blasphemy. I believe that a man's true happiness consists in accomplishing God's will, which I believe is for all to love him to serve their kind forever, as God has all men to act for him; and this is, according to the Gospels, the gist of all the decrees and prophecies. I believe that the meaning of life, for each of us, is but The love of life, I believe that the development of our love power in this life is a happiness that increases every day, and in another world, it is a happiness that is more perfect; I believe that the growth of this love is better than any Other powers are more capable of establishing the kingdom of heaven on earth, in other words, of replacing an organization of life of separation, deceit, and violence with a new system of harmony, truth, and fraternity. I believe that in love There is only one way for us to make progress: Prayer. Not communal prayer in temples, which Christ rejected. But prayer as Christ exemplifies, solitary prayer, which gives us a more solid sense of meaning in life. consciousness... I believe that life is eternal, I believe that man is rewarded according to his deeds, in this world and in the world to come, in the present and in the future. I believe so firmly in all this that I am dying At my age, I would have had to make a great effort to prevent my selfish wish for the death of the body—that is, for the birth of a new life.” See Paris, May 1, 1901, Le Times Essay on Tolstoy.