The Brothers Karamazov (48 page)

“‘And everyone will be happy, all the millions of beings, with the exception of the hundred thousand men who are called upon to rule over them. For only we, the keepers of the secret, will be unhappy. There will be millions upon millions of happy babes and one hundred thousand sufferers who have accepted the burden of the knowledge of good and evil. They will die peacefully with Your name on their lips, but beyond the grave they will find nothing but death. But we shall keep the secret and, for their own happiness, we shall dangle before them the reward of eternal, heavenly bliss. For we know that, even if there is something in the other world, it is certainly not for such as they. They say and prophesy that You will come again with Your proud, strong chosen ones and that You will be triumphant. But our answer will be that those around You have saved only themselves, whereas we have saved all mankind. It is said that the whore who rides the beast and holds the 
mystery
 in her hands will be put to shame, that the weak will rise and rend her royal robes and expose her vile naked body. But I will rise then and show You the millions upon millions of happy babes who have known no sin. And we, who have taken their sins upon us to give them happiness, will stand up and say to You: “Judge us if You can and if You dare!” Know that I am not afraid of You; know that I, too, lived in the wilderness, fed upon roots and locusts, that I, too, blessed the freedom which You bestowed upon men, and that I, too, was prepared to take my place among the strong chosen ones, aspiring to be counted among them. But I came to my senses and refused to serve a mad cause. I turned away and joined those who were endeavoring to 
correct Your work
. I left the proud and turned to the meek, for the happiness of the meek. What I have told You will happen and our kingdom will come. I repeat, tomorrow You will see obedient herds, at the first sign from me, hurry to heap coals on the fire beneath the stake at which I shall have You burned, because, by coming here, You have made our task more difficult. For if anyone has ever deserved our fire, it is You, and I shall have You burned tomorrow. 
Dixi!
’ ”

Ivan stopped. His emotion had gradually increased as he spoke, reaching its highest point at the end. But when he stopped, he suddenly smiled.

Alyosha, who at first had listened in silence, had also become very agitated toward the end; he looked as if he wanted to interrupt his brother and was restraining himself with great difficulty. Now, when Ivan stopped, words gushed from him, as if he could no longer hold them back.

“But it makes no sense!” he cried, turning red. “Your poem is no disparagement of Jesus, as you intended—it is in praise of Him! And who will accept what you say of freedom in the way you want it to be understood? Is that the way the Russian Orthodox Church interprets it? That is the reasoning of a Roman Catholic, but it doesn’t even give a fair picture of their views either. It represents only the worst there is in Catholicism—its inquisitors and Jesuits! Besides, your inquisitor is too fantastic; such a character is quite impossible. And what sort of sins of others do these people take upon themselves? And also, who are these keepers of the secret—of the 
mystery
—who are willing to bear some peculiar curse for the sake of the happiness of mankind? Who has ever heard of them? We know there are Jesuits with a pretty bad reputation, but they are nothing like what you describe. They are nothing, nothing, like that; in fact, they’re simply the Pope’s army, preparing the way for the establishment of their future empire on earth, with the Roman pontiff at its head. That is their actual goal and there is no 
mystery
 or sad, noble resignation in it: theirs is a plain and simple lust for power, low, despicable material advantages, enslavement of the people—something like Russian serfdom used to be, with them as the landowners . . . That’s all they are after. They may not even believe in God for all I know. No, your tormented inquisitor is nothing but a figment of your fantasy.”

“Wait a minute, don’t get so excited,” Ivan laughed. “You say it is a fantasy. Very good, I concede, it most certainly is a fantasy. Tell me one thing, though: Do you really believe that, during these centuries, the Catholics have directed all their efforts merely at seizing power in order to gain what you call low, despicable material advantages? Did you get that, by any chance, from that Father Paisii of yours?”

“No, no, not at all . . . In fact, once Father Paisii said something that resembles a bit what you were saying . . . But, no, of course it wasn’t the same thing at all!” Alyosha added hurriedly, as if as an afterthought.

“I’m delighted to hear it, although you say it wasn’t the same thing at all. What I’m asking you is this: Do you really think that the Jesuits and inquisitors would plot like that for the sake of mere despicable material advantages? Why couldn’t there be among them one martyr, a man filled with great sadness and love for his fellow men? Just assume that, among all those interested only in material gain, there is one, only one, man like my grand inquisitor, who has lived on roots by himself in the wilderness, who has writhed in agony to overcome the needs of the flesh, in his efforts to gain freedom and perfection. Then that man, who has always loved his fellow men, suddenly realizes how puny is the moral satisfaction of achieving a triumph of will when he is convinced that millions of other children of God have been created as a sort of mockery, that they will never be able to cope with the freedom that has been forced upon them, that these wretched rebels will never grow into giants who will complete the construction of the tower of Babel. It was not geese such as these that our great idealist visualized joining in the final harmony. And so, having understood that, he turns around and joins the . . . well, the intelligent people. Why can’t you imagine that something like that could happen?”

“Whom did he join, did you say? Who are these intelligent people?” Alyosha cried, almost angrily. “There’s nothing so very intelligent about them, nor do they have any secrets or mysteries . . . Their only secret is their godlessness, and your inquisitor’s only secret is that he doesn’t believe in God, that’s all!”

“Fine! Let’s assume you are right. You’ve guessed it at last! And it’s true—that is the only secret he has. But wouldn’t a man who had spent his whole life in the wilderness performing acts of self-sacrifice and devotion without curing himself of his love and concern for mankind, wouldn’t such a man suffer? In the last years that are left to him, it becomes clear to him that only the guidance of the great, wise, and dreaded spirit would make it possible to organize feeble and undisciplined men in such a way as to make their lives bearable, for they are just unfinished, ridiculous attempts, created in mockery. He becomes convinced that his duty is to follow the instructions of the wise spirit of death and destruction. And so he is willing to use lies and deception to lead men consciously to their death and destruction, while at the same time deceiving them, so that they will not see where they are being led, so that, at least on the way, these wretched, blind creatures may think they are happy. And I want you to note that the old inquisitor will be deceiving them in the name of the one in whom he believed so ardently for most of his life! Isn’t that suffering, tell me? And if even just one man like that finds himself at the head of the whole army of those who crave nothing but power and despicable material gains, even so, wouldn’t one such man be enough to make it a tragedy? I’ll go even further: I say that, with one such man at their head, they would be a true, guiding ideal for the whole Roman Church with its armies and its Jesuits. I am also absolutely convinced that there has never been any lack of such individuals among those who head their movement; possibly even some of the popes themselves were such exceptional individuals. And who knows, perhaps a tormented old man who loves mankind as stubbornly as my inquisitor exists today, perhaps there is even a whole army of such individuals, and perhaps they exist not by mere chance but as the result of combined efforts to form an alliance whose aim is to keep the secret from the weak and the wretched, in order to make them happy. This, I am sure, is true, because it is bound to be. I even have the impression that the Freemasons are founded on a mystery of that sort, which would explain why the Catholics hate them, seeing in them competitors threatening to split their unifying idea; for they believe that there must be only one shepherd and one herd . . . But, in defending my idea this way, I sound like an author who cannot bear criticism. So we might as well talk about something else.”

“Perhaps you’re a Mason yourself!” Alyosha blurted out angrily, but then added at once with great sadness: “You don’t really believe in God.” He had the impression that his brother was looking at him sarcastically; he lowered his eyes and asked: “Does it have an ending, your poem, or is that how it ends?”

“Here’s how I propose to end it,” Ivan said, continuing.

“The Grand Inquisitor falls silent and waits for some time for the prisoner to answer. The prisoner’s silence has weighed on him. He has watched Him; He listened to him intently, looking gently into his eyes, and apparently unwilling to speak. The old man longs for Him to say something, however painful and terrifying. But instead, He suddenly goes over to the old man and kisses him gently on his old, bloodless lips. And that is His only answer. The old man is startled and shudders. The corners of his lips seem to quiver slightly. He walks to the door, opens it, and says to Him, ‘Go now, and do not come back . . . ever. You must never, never come again!’ And he lets the prisoner out into the dark streets of the city. The prisoner leaves.”

“And what about the old man?”

“The kiss glows in his heart . . . But the old man sticks to his old idea.”

“And you too, you stick to it?” Alyosha cried out bitterly. Ivan laughed.

“You know what,” he said, “it’s all nonsense really, a meaningless poem by a scatter-brained student who’s never written two lines of poetry in his life. Why must you take it so seriously? Or do you expect me to rush off at once and join the crowd of Jesuits devising corrections of His work? Don’t you understand that I really don’t give a damn about anything, that, as I told you before, I’m only interested in lasting out until I’m thirty, because by then I’ll be willing to throw down the cup of life.”

“And what about your sticky little leaves and the graves that are so dear to you and the blue sky and the woman you love?” Alyosha said bitterly. “How will you be able to live until then and love all those things with the hell that is in your heart and in your head? No, you 
are
 going to join them now or else you will kill yourself, because you won’t be able to stand it!”

“There is a drive in me that can withstand anything,” Ivan said coldly, with a twisted grin.

“What drive?”

“The Karamazov drive—the vile, earthly drive.”

“You mean you plan to drown yourself in debauchery, to disintegrate your soul by rotting it? Is that what you want?”

“Something like that . . . I guess, though, I’ll avoid it until I’m thirty, but after that, well yes . . .”

“And how do you intend to avoid it until then? How will you manage it, with those ideas of yours?”

“There again, I’ll act like a Karamazov.”

“By that you mean you’ll act as if ‘everything is permitted’? For you feel that’s true—whatever you do is all right?”

Ivan frowned and suddenly turned very pale.

“Now you’ve picked up the phrase that shocked Miusov so much yesterday and that Dmitry picked up and repeated rather naively,” Ivan said, smiling crookedly. “Well, since you’ve brought it up—I suppose everything is permitted, just as I said; I don’t take it back. And I don’t dislike our dear Mitya’s formulation either.”

Alyosha stared at him in silence.

“Ah, my little Alyosha, I thought that when I left this town you would be the only friend I had in the world,” Ivan said with sudden feeling, “but now I realize that there is no room for me even in your heart, my dear recluse. Well, I won’t go back on my idea that everything is permitted, but then, will you, too, turn your back on me?”

Alyosha stood up, walked over to him, and, without a word, kissed him on the lips.

“That’s plagiarism!” Ivan shouted, suddenly beaming with delight. “You stole it from my poem! But it’s time we were on our way, Alyosha. We’ve got things to do, both of us.”

They went downstairs, but stopped outside the inn.

“Know what, Alyosha?” Ivan said with deliberation. “If I last long enough to get around to the sticky little leaves, I will love them only thinking of you. The thought that you are somewhere here will be enough for me not to lose all desire to live. Is that good enough for you? If you want, you may take this as a declaration of my affection for you. But for now, you’re turning right and I’m turning left, and that’s that, understand? I mean that if I’m still in town tomorrow (which is extremely unlikely, for I expect to leave today) and if we happen to meet, I don’t want to even mention any of these topics, not a word. Please, remember that. And also I’d like you never to mention our brother Dmitry to me, never!” he added irritatedly. “So now we’ve exhausted all possible topics, discussed everything. But I promise you this: when I’m close to thirty and decide to throw down my cup of life, I’ll come especially to have one more talk with you—wherever I may be, even if I’m in America, I’ll come all the way back to see you. Besides, I’ll be very curious to have a look at you and see what you’re like then. This is a rather solemn promise, as you can see, but then, we may be parting now for as long as seven, perhaps even ten, years. Well, go and join your Pater Seraphicus then, since he’s dying, and if he happens to have died without you, you may be angry with me for having held you up. Good-by then, kiss me once more. Good. Now be off.”

Ivan turned away abruptly and walked off. He did not once look back. It was a bit the way Dmitry had left Alyosha the day before, but it was also somehow quite different. That impression flashed like a red streak among the painful, sorrowful thoughts that were churning in Alyosha’s head. He stood for a while, following Ivan with his eyes. Suddenly it struck him that Ivan rolled slightly as he walked, listing to the right, so that from behind it seemed to Alyosha that his right shoulder was lower than his left. Alyosha had never noticed that Ivan walked like that before. Then, all of a sudden Alyosha turned in the opposite direction, hurrying off toward the monastery. The day was already fading and he suddenly felt a strange fear creeping over him. Some new, unknown shadow was rising before him and he could not find an answer to it. As on the previous evening, a strong wind was rising and the ageless pine trees rustled gloomily on either side of him as he crossed the little wood between the monastery and the hermitage. He was almost running. “Where did he get that Pater Seraphicus from?” flashed through his head. “Ah, poor, poor Ivan, when will I see you again? Here’s the hermitage. Oh, God! Yes, yes, he 
is
 Pater Seraphicus, he’ll save me . . . he’ll save me from him, save me forever . . .”