In my estimation, this chapter from Dostoyevsky's epic novel The Brothers Karamazov is not only a specimen of exquisite literature, it is inspired; almost scripture, as it were.
I read it at least once annually. Each time, before I read it, I read the relevant passages of scripture from the King James Version of the Holy Bible (links below).
It can be somewhat dense reading in places – Dostoyevsky is, after all, exceedingly Russian.
But stick with it. Give it a chance. It has something very important to say. It was first published in 1879, but it was written for our day.
Download PDF version of The Grand Inquisitor
The Grand Inquisitor
an excerpt from
The Brothers Karamazov
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
"EVEN this must have a
preface—that is, a literary preface," laughed Ivan, "and I am a poor
hand at making one. You see, my action takes place in the sixteenth century,
and at that time, as you probably learnt at school, it was customary in poetry
to bring down heavenly powers on earth. Not to speak of Dante, in France,
clerks, as well as the monks in the monasteries, used to give regular
performances in which the Madonna, the saints, the angels, Christ, and God
Himself were brought on the stage. In those days it was done in all simplicity.
In Victor Hugo's Notre Dame de Paris an edifying and gratuitous spectacle was
provided for the people in the Hotel de Ville of Paris in the reign of Louis XI
in honour of the birth of the dauphin. It was called Le bon jugement de la tres sainte et gracieuse Vierge Marie, and
she appears herself on the stage and pronounces her bon jugement. Similar
plays, chiefly from the Old Testament, were occasionally performed in Moscow
too, up to the times of Peter the Great. But besides plays there were all sorts
of legends and ballads scattered about the world, in which the saints and
angels and all the powers of Heaven took part when required. In our monasteries
the monks busied themselves in translating, copying, and even composing such
poems—and even under the Tatars. There is, for instance, one such poem (of
course, from the Greek), The Wanderings
of Our Lady through Hell, with descriptions as bold as Dante's. Our Lady
visits hell, and the Archangel Michael leads her through the torments. She sees
the sinners and their punishment. There she sees among others one noteworthy
set of sinners in a burning lake; some of them sink to the bottom of the lake
so that they can't swim out, and 'these God forgets'—an expression of
extraordinary depth and force. And so Our Lady, shocked and weeping, falls
before the throne of God and begs for mercy for all in hell—for all she has
seen there, indiscriminately. Her conversation with God is immensely
interesting. She beseeches Him, she will not desist, and when God points to the
hands and feet of her Son, nailed to the Cross, and asks, 'How can I forgive
His tormentors?' she bids all the saints, all the martyrs, all the angels and
archangels to fall down with her and pray for mercy on all without distinction.
It ends by her winning from God a respite of suffering every year from Good
Friday till Trinity Day, and the sinners at once raise a cry of thankfulness
from hell, chanting, 'Thou art just, O Lord, in this judgment.' Well, my poem
would have been of that kind if it had appeared at that time. He comes on the
scene in my poem, but He says nothing, only appears and passes on. Fifteen
centuries have passed since He promised to come in His glory, fifteen centuries
since His prophet wrote, 'Behold, I come quickly'; 'Of that day and that hour
knoweth no man, neither the Son, but the Father,' as He Himself predicted on
earth. But humanity awaits him with the same faith and with the same love. Oh,
with greater faith, for it is fifteen centuries since man has ceased to see
signs from heaven.
No
signs from heaven come to-day
To
add to what the heart doth say.
There was nothing left but faith in
what the heart doth say. It is true there were many miracles in those days.
There were saints who performed miraculous cures; some holy people, according
to their biographies, were visited by the Queen of Heaven herself. But the
devil did not slumber, and doubts were already arising among men of the truth
of these miracles. And just then there appeared in the north of Germany a
terrible new heresy. 'A huge star like to a torch' (that is, to a church) 'fell
on the sources of the waters and they became bitter.' These heretics began blasphemously
denying miracles. But those who remained faithful were all the more ardent in
their faith. The tears of humanity rose up to Him as before, awaited His
coming, loved Him, hoped for Him, yearned to suffer and die for Him as before.
And so many ages mankind had prayed with faith and fervour, 'O Lord our God,
hasten Thy coming'; so many ages called upon Him, that in His infinite mercy He
deigned to come down to His servants. Before that day He had come down, He had
visited some holy men, martyrs, and hermits, as is written in their lives.
Among us, Tyutchev, with absolute faith in the truth of his words, bore witness
that
Bearing
the Cross, in slavish dress,
Weary
and worn, the Heavenly King
Our
mother, Russia, came to bless,
And
through our land went wandering.
And
that certainly was so, I assure you.
"And behold, He deigned to
appear for a moment to the people, to the tortured, suffering people, sunk in
iniquity, but loving Him like children. My story is laid in Spain, in Seville,
in the most terrible time of the Inquisition, when fires were lighted every day
to the glory of God, and 'in the splendid auto da fe the wicked heretics were
burnt.' Oh, of course, this was not the coming in which He will appear,
according to His promise, at the end of time in all His heavenly glory, and
which will be sudden 'as lightning flashing from east to west.' No, He visited
His children only for a moment, and there where the flames were crackling round
the heretics. In His infinite mercy He came once more among men in that human
shape in which He walked among men for thirty-three years fifteen centuries
ago. He came down to the 'hot pavements' of the southern town in which on the
day before almost a hundred heretics had, ad
majorem gloriam Dei, been burnt by the cardinal, the Grand Inquisitor, in a
magnificent auto da fe, in the
presence of the king, the court, the knights, the cardinals, the most charming
ladies of the court, and the whole population of Seville.
"He came softly, unobserved, and
yet, strange to say, everyone recognised Him. That might be one of the best
passages in the poem. I mean, why they recognised Him. The people are
irresistibly drawn to Him, they surround Him, they flock about Him, follow Him.
He moves silently in their midst with a gentle smile of infinite compassion.
The sun of love burns in His heart, and power shines from His eyes, and their
radiance, shed on the people, stirs their hearts with responsive love. He holds
out His hands to them, blesses them, and a healing virtue comes from contact
with Him, even with His garments. An old man in the crowd, blind from
childhood, cries out, 'O Lord, heal me and I shall see Thee!' and, as it were,
scales fall from his eyes and the blind man sees Him. The crowd weeps and
kisses the earth under His feet. Children throw flowers before Him, sing, and
cry hosannah. 'It is He—it is He!' repeat. 'It must be He, it can be no one but
Him!' He stops at the steps of the Seville cathedral at the moment when the
weeping mourners are bringing in a little open white coffin. In it lies a child
of seven, the only daughter of a prominent citizen. The dead child lies hidden
in flowers. 'He will raise your child,' the crowd shouts to the weeping mother.
The priest, coming to meet the coffin, looks perplexed, and frowns, but the
mother of the dead child throws herself at His feet with a wail. 'If it is
Thou, raise my child!' she cries, holding out her hands to Him. The procession
halts, the coffin is laid on the steps at His feet. He looks with compassion,
and His lips once more softly pronounce, 'Maiden, arise!' and the maiden
arises. The little girl sits up in the coffin and looks round, smiling with
wide-open wondering eyes, holding a bunch of white roses they had put in her
hand.
"There are cries, sobs, confusion
among the people, and at that moment the cardinal himself, the Grand
Inquisitor, passes by the cathedral. He is an old man, almost ninety, tall and
erect, with a withered face and sunken eyes, in which there is still a gleam of
light. He is not dressed in his gorgeous cardinal's robes, as he was the day
before, when he was burning the enemies of the Roman Church -- at this moment
he is wearing his coarse, old, monk's cassock. At a distance behind him come
his gloomy assistants and slaves and the 'holy guard.' He stops at the sight of
the crowd and watches it from a distance. He sees everything; he sees them set
the coffin down at His feet, sees the child rise up, and his face darkens. He
knits his thick grey brows and his eyes gleam with a sinister fire. He holds
out his finger and bids the guards take Him. And such is his power, so
completely are the people cowed into submission and trembling obedience to him,
that the crowd immediately makes way for the guards, and in the midst of
deathlike silence they lay hands on Him and lead him away. The crowd instantly
bows down to the earth, like one man, before the old Inquisitor. He blesses the
people in silence and passes on.' The guards lead their prisoner to the close,
gloomy vaulted prison—in the ancient palace of the Holy Inquisition and shut
him in it. The day passes and is followed by the dark, burning, 'breathless'
night of Seville. The air is 'fragrant with laurel and lemon.' In the pitch
darkness the iron door of the prison is suddenly opened and the Grand
Inquisitor himself comes in with a light in his hand. He is alone; the door is
closed at once behind him. He stands in the doorway and for a minute or two
gazes into His face. At last he goes up slowly, sets the light on the table and
speaks.
"'Is it Thou? Thou?' but
receiving no answer, he adds at once. 'Don't answer, be silent. What canst Thou
say, indeed? I know too well what Thou wouldst say. And Thou hast no right to
add anything to what Thou hadst said of old. Why, then, art Thou come to hinder
us? For Thou hast come to hinder us, and Thou knowest that. But dost thou know
what will be tomorrow? I know not who Thou art and care not to know whether it
is Thou or only a semblance of Him, but tomorrow I shall condemn Thee and burn
Thee at the stake as the worst of heretics. And the very people who have today
kissed Thy feet, tomorrow at the faintest sign from me will rush to heap up the
embers of Thy fire. Knowest Thou that? Yes, maybe Thou knowest it,' he added
with thoughtful penetration, never for a moment taking his eyes off the
Prisoner."
"I don't quite understand, Ivan.
What does it mean?" Alyosha, who had been listening in silence, said with
a smile. "Is it simply a wild fantasy, or a mistake on the part of the old
man—some impossible quid pro quo?"
"Take it as the last," said
Ivan, laughing, "if you are so corrupted by modern realism and can't stand
anything fantastic. If you like it to be a case of mistaken identity, let it be
so. It is true," he went on, laughing, "the old man was ninety, and
he might well be crazy over his set idea. He might have been struck by the
appearance of the Prisoner. It might, in fact, be simply his ravings, the
delusion of an old man of ninety, over-excited by the auto da fe of a hundred heretics the day before. But does it matter
to us after all whether it was a mistake of identity or a wild fantasy? All
that matters is that the old man should speak out, that he should speak openly
of what he has thought in silence for ninety years."
"And the Prisoner too is silent?
Does He look at him and not say a word?"
"That's inevitable in any
case," Ivan laughed again. "The old man has told Him He hasn't the
right to add anything to what He has said of old. One may say it is the most
fundamental feature of Roman Catholicism, in my opinion at least. 'All has been
given by Thee to the Pope,' they say, 'and all, therefore, is still in the
Pope's hands, and there is no need for Thee to come now at all. Thou must not
meddle for the time, at least.' That's how they speak and write too -- the
Jesuits, at any rate. I have read it myself in the works of their theologians.
'Hast Thou the right to reveal to us one of the mysteries of that world from
which Thou hast come?' my old man asks Him, and answers the question for Him.
'No, Thou hast not; that Thou mayest not add to what has been said of old, and
mayest not take from men the freedom which Thou didst exalt when Thou wast on
earth. Whatsoever Thou revealest anew will encroach on men's freedom of faith;
for it will be manifest as a miracle, and the freedom of their faith was dearer
to Thee than anything in those days fifteen hundred years ago. Didst Thou not
often say then, "I will make you free"? But now Thou hast seen these
"free" men,' the old man adds suddenly, with a pensive smile. 'Yes,
we've paid dearly for it,' he goes on, looking sternly at Him, 'but at last we
have completed that work in Thy name. For fifteen centuries we have been
wrestling with Thy freedom, but now it is ended and over for good. Dost Thou not
believe that it's over for good? Thou lookest meekly at me and deignest not
even to be wroth with me. But let me tell Thee that now, to-day, people are
more persuaded than ever that they have perfect freedom, yet they have brought
their freedom to us and laid it humbly at our feet. But that has been our
doing. Was this what Thou didst? Was this Thy freedom?'"
"I don't understand again."
Alyosha broke in. "Is he ironical, is he jesting?"
"Not a bit of it! He claims it
as a merit for himself and his Church that at last they have vanquished freedom
and have done so to make men happy. 'For now' (he is speaking of the
Inquisition, of course) 'for the first time it has become possible to think of
the happiness of men. Man was created a rebel; and how can rebels be happy?
Thou wast warned,' he says to Him. 'Thou hast had no lack of admonitions and
warnings, but Thou didst not listen to those warnings; Thou didst reject the
only way by which men might be made happy. But, fortunately, departing Thou
didst hand on the work to us. Thou hast promised, Thou hast established by Thy
word, Thou hast given to us the right to bind and to unbind, and now, of
course, Thou canst not think of taking it away. Why, then, hast Thou come to
hinder us?'"
"And what's the meaning of 'no
lack of admonitions and warnings'?" asked Alyosha.
"Why, that's the chief part of
what the old man must say.
"Judge
Thyself who was right—Thou or he who questioned Thee then? Remember the first
question; its meaning, in other words, was this: "Thou wouldst go into the
world, and art going with empty hands, with some promise of freedom which men
in their simplicity and their natural unruliness cannot even understand, which
they fear and dread—for nothing has ever been more insupportable for a man and
a human society than freedom. But seest Thou these stones in this parched and
barren wilderness? Turn them into bread, and mankind will run after Thee like a
flock of sheep, grateful and obedient, though for ever trembling, lest Thou
withdraw Thy hand and deny them Thy bread." But Thou wouldst not deprive
man of freedom and didst reject the offer, thinking, what is that freedom worth
if obedience is bought with bread? Thou didst reply that man lives not by bread
alone. But dost Thou know that for the sake of that earthly bread the spirit of
the earth will rise up against Thee and will strive with Thee and overcome
Thee, and all will follow him, crying, "Who can compare with this beast?
He has given us fire from heaven!" Dost Thou know that the ages will pass,
and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime,
and therefore no sin; there is only hunger? "Feed men, and then ask of
them virtue!" that's what they'll write on the banner, which they will
raise against Thee, and with which they will destroy Thy temple. Where Thy
temple stood will rise a new building; the terrible tower of Babel will be
built again, and though, like the one of old, it will not be finished, yet Thou
mightest have prevented that new tower and have cut short the sufferings of men
for a thousand years; for they will come back to us after a thousand years of
agony with their tower. They will seek us again, hidden underground in the
catacombs, for we shall be again persecuted and tortured. They will find us and
cry to us, "Feed us, for those who have promised us fire from heaven
haven't given it!" And then we shall finish building their tower, for he
finishes the building who feeds them. And we alone shall feed them in Thy name,
declaring falsely that it is in Thy name. Oh, never, never can they feed themselves
without us! No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the
end they will lay their freedom at our feet, and say to us, "Make us your
slaves, but feed us." They will understand themselves, at last, that
freedom and bread enough for all are inconceivable together, for never, never
will they be able to share between them! They will be convinced, too, that they
can never be free, for they are weak, vicious, worthless, and rebellious. Thou
didst promise them the bread of Heaven, but, I repeat again, can it compare
with earthly bread in the eyes of the weak, ever sinful and ignoble race of
man? And if for the sake of the bread of Heaven thousands shall follow Thee,
what is to become of the millions and tens of thousands of millions of
creatures who will not have the strength to forego the earthly bread for the
sake of the heavenly? Or dost Thou care only for the tens of thousands of the
great and strong, while the millions, numerous as the sands of the sea, who are
weak but love Thee, must exist only for the sake of the great and strong? No,
we care for the weak too. They are sinful and rebellious, but in the end they
too will become obedient. They will marvel at us and look on us as gods,
because we are ready to endure the freedom which they have found so dreadful
and to rule over them- so awful it will seem to them to be free. But we shall
tell them that we are Thy servants and rule them in Thy name. We shall deceive
them again, for we will not let Thee come to us again. That deception will be
our suffering, for we shall be forced to lie.
"'This is the significance of
the first question in the wilderness, and this is what Thou hast rejected for
the sake of that freedom which Thou hast exalted above everything. Yet in this
question lies hid the great secret of this world. Choosing "bread,"
Thou wouldst have satisfied the universal and everlasting craving of
humanity—to find someone to worship. So long as man remains free he strives for
nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find someone to worship. But man
seeks to worship what is established beyond dispute, so that all men would
agree at once to worship it. For these pitiful creatures are concerned not only
to find what one or the other can worship, but to find community of worship is
the chief misery of every man individually and of all humanity from the
beginning of time. For the sake of common worship they've slain each other with
the sword. They have set up gods and challenged one another, "Put away
your gods and come and worship ours, or we will kill you and your gods!"
And so it will be to the end of the world, even when gods disappear from the
earth; they will fall down before idols just the same. Thou didst know, Thou
couldst not but have known, this fundamental secret of human nature, but Thou
didst reject the one infallible banner which was offered Thee to make all men
bow down to Thee alone—the banner of earthly bread; and Thou hast rejected it
for the sake of freedom and the bread of Heaven. Behold what Thou didst further.
And all again in the name of freedom! I tell Thee that man is tormented by no
greater anxiety than to find someone quickly to whom he can hand over that gift
of freedom with which the ill-fated creature is born. But only one who can
appease their conscience can take over their freedom. In bread there was
offered Thee an invincible banner; give bread, and man will worship thee, for
nothing is more certain than bread. But if someone else gains possession of his
conscience—Oh! then he will cast away Thy bread and follow after him who has
ensnared his conscience. In that Thou wast right. For the secret of man's being
is not only to live but to have something to live for. Without a stable
conception of the object of life, man would not consent to go on living, and
would rather destroy himself than remain on earth, though he had bread in
abundance. That is true. But what happened? Instead of taking men's freedom
from them, Thou didst make it greater than ever! Didst Thou forget that man
prefers peace, and even death, to freedom of choice in the knowledge of good
and evil? Nothing is more seductive for man than his freedom of conscience, but
nothing is a greater cause of suffering. And behold, instead of giving a firm
foundation for setting the conscience of man at rest for ever, Thou didst
choose all that is exceptional, vague and enigmatic; Thou didst choose what was
utterly beyond the strength of men, acting as though Thou didst not love them
at all- Thou who didst come to give Thy life for them! Instead of taking
possession of men's freedom, Thou didst increase it, and burdened the spiritual
kingdom of mankind with its sufferings for ever. Thou didst desire man's free
love, that he should follow Thee freely, enticed and taken captive by Thee. In
place of the rigid ancient law, man must hereafter with free heart decide for
himself what is good and what is evil, having only Thy image before him as his
guide. But didst Thou not know that he would at last reject even Thy image and
Thy truth, if he is weighed down with the fearful burden of free choice? They
will cry aloud at last that the truth is not in Thee, for they could not have
been left in greater confusion and suffering than Thou hast caused, laying upon
them so many cares and unanswerable problems.
"'So that, in truth, Thou didst
Thyself lay the foundation for the destruction of Thy kingdom, and no one is
more to blame for it. Yet what was offered Thee? There are three powers, three
powers alone, able to conquer and to hold captive for ever the conscience of
these impotent rebels for their happiness those forces are miracle, mystery and
authority. Thou hast rejected all three and hast set the example for doing so.
When the wise and dread spirit set Thee on the pinnacle of the temple and said
to Thee, "If Thou wouldst know whether Thou art the Son of God then cast
Thyself down, for it is written: the angels shall hold him up lest he fall and
bruise himself, and Thou shalt know then whether Thou art the Son of God and
shalt prove then how great is Thy faith in Thy Father." But Thou didst
refuse and wouldst not cast Thyself down. Oh, of course, Thou didst proudly and
well, like God; but the weak, unruly race of men, are they gods? Oh, Thou didst
know then that in taking one step, in making one movement to cast Thyself down,
Thou wouldst be tempting God and have lost all Thy faith in Him, and wouldst
have been dashed to pieces against that earth which Thou didst come to save.
And the wise spirit that tempted Thee would have rejoiced. But I ask again, are
there many like Thee? And couldst Thou believe for one moment that men, too,
could face such a temptation? Is the nature of men such, that they can reject
miracle, and at the great moments of their life, the moments of their deepest,
most agonising spiritual difficulties, cling only to the free verdict of the
heart? Oh, Thou didst know that Thy deed would be recorded in books, would be
handed down to remote times and the utmost ends of the earth, and Thou didst
hope that man, following Thee, would cling to God and not ask for a miracle.
But Thou didst not know that when man rejects miracle he rejects God too; for
man seeks not so much God as the miraculous. And as man cannot bear to be
without the miraculous, he will create new miracles of his own for himself, and
will worship deeds of sorcery and witchcraft, though he might be a hundred
times over a rebel, heretic and infidel. Thou didst not come down from the
Cross when they shouted to Thee, mocking and reviling Thee, "Come down
from the cross and we will believe that Thou art He." Thou didst not come
down, for again Thou wouldst not enslave man by a miracle, and didst crave
faith given freely, not based on miracle. Thou didst crave for free love and
not the base raptures of the slave before the might that has overawed him for
ever. But Thou didst think too highly of men therein, for they are slaves, of
course, though rebellious by nature. Look round and judge; fifteen centuries
have passed, look upon them. Whom hast Thou raised up to Thyself? I swear, man
is weaker and baser by nature than Thou hast believed him! Can he, can he do
what Thou didst? By showing him so much respect, Thou didst, as it were, cease
to feel for him, for Thou didst ask far too much from him—Thou who hast loved
him more than Thyself! Respecting him less, Thou wouldst have asked less of
him. That would have been more like love, for his burden would have been
lighter. He is weak and vile. What though he is everywhere now rebelling
against our power, and proud of his rebellion? It is the pride of a child and a
schoolboy. They are little children rioting and barring out the teacher at
school. But their childish delight will end; it will cost them dear. Mankind as
a whole has always striven to organise a universal state. There have been many
great nations with great histories, but the more highly they were developed the
more unhappy they were, for they felt more acutely than other people the
craving for world-wide union. The great conquerors, Timours and Ghenghis-Khans,
whirled like hurricanes over the face of the earth striving to subdue its
people, and they too were but the unconscious expression of the same craving
for universal unity. Hadst Thou taken the world and Caesar's purple, Thou
wouldst have founded the universal state and have given universal peace. For
who can rule men if not he who holds their conscience and their bread in his
hands? We have taken the sword of Caesar, and in taking it, of course, have
rejected Thee and followed him. Oh, ages are yet to come of the confusion of
free thought, of their science and cannibalism. For having begun to build their
tower of Babel without us, they will end, of course, with cannibalism. But then
the beast will crawl to us and lick our feet and spatter them with tears of
blood. And we shall sit upon the beast and raise the cup, and on it will be
written, "Mystery." But then, and only then, the reign of peace and
happiness will come for men. Thou art proud of Thine elect, but Thou hast only
the elect, while we give rest to all. And besides, how many of those elect,
those mighty ones who could become elect, have grown weary waiting for Thee,
and have transferred and will transfer the powers of their spirit and the
warmth of their heart to the other camp, and end by raising their free banner
against Thee. Thou didst Thyself lift up that banner. But with us all will be
happy and will no more rebel nor destroy one another as under Thy freedom. Oh,
we shall persuade them that they will only become free when they renounce their
freedom to us and submit to us. And shall we be right or shall we be lying?
They will be convinced that we are right, for they will remember the horrors of
slavery and confusion to which Thy freedom brought them. Freedom, free thought,
and science will lead them into such straits and will bring them face to face
with such marvels and insoluble mysteries, that some of them, the fierce and
rebellious, will destroy themselves, others, rebellious but weak, will destroy
one another, while the rest, weak and unhappy, will crawl fawning to our feet
and whine to us: "Yes, you were right, you alone possess His mystery, and
we come back to you, save us from ourselves!"
"'Receiving bread from us, they
will see clearly that we take the bread made by their hands from them, to give
it to them, without any miracle. They will see that we do not change the stones
to bread, but in truth they will be more thankful for taking it from our hands
than for the bread itself! For they will remember only too well that in old
days, without our help, even the bread they made turned to stones in their
hands, while since they have come back to us, the very stones have turned to
bread in their hands. Too, too well will they know the value of complete
submission! And until men know that, they will be unhappy. Who is most to blame
for their not knowing it?-speak! Who scattered the flock and sent it astray on
unknown paths? But the flock will come together again and will submit once
more, and then it will be once for all. Then we shall give them the quiet
humble happiness of weak creatures such as they are by nature. Oh, we shall
persuade them at last not to be proud, for Thou didst lift them up and thereby
taught them to be proud. We shall show them that they are weak, that they are
only pitiful children, but that childlike happiness is the sweetest of all.
They will become timid and will look to us and huddle close to us in fear, as
chicks to the hen. They will marvel at us and will be awe-stricken before us,
and will be proud at our being so powerful and clever that we have been able to
subdue such a turbulent flock of thousands of millions. They will tremble
impotently before our wrath, their minds will grow fearful, they will be quick
to shed tears like women and children, but they will be just as ready at a sign
from us to pass to laughter and rejoicing, to happy mirth and childish song.
Yes, we shall set them to work, but in their leisure hours we shall make their
life like a child's game, with children's songs and innocent dance. Oh, we
shall allow them even sin, they are weak and helpless, and they will love us
like children because we allow them to sin. We shall tell them that every sin
will be expiated, if it is done with our permission, that we allow them to sin
because we love them, and the punishment for these sins we take upon ourselves.
And we shall take it upon ourselves, and they will adore us as their saviours
who have taken on themselves their sins before God. And they will have no
secrets from us. We shall allow or forbid them to live with their wives and mistresses,
to have or not to have children according to whether they have been obedient or
disobedient—and they will submit to us gladly and cheerfully. The most painful
secrets of their conscience, all, all they will bring to us, and we shall have
an answer for all. And they will be glad to believe our answer, for it will
save them from the great anxiety and terrible agony they endure at present in
making a free decision for themselves. And all will be happy, all the millions
of creatures except the hundred thousand who rule over them. For only we, we
who guard the mystery, shall be unhappy. There will be thousands of millions of
happy babes, and a hundred thousand sufferers who have taken upon themselves
the curse of the knowledge of good and evil. Peacefully they will die,
peacefully they will expire in Thy name, and beyond the grave they will find
nothing but death. But we shall keep the secret, and for their happiness we
shall allure them with the reward of heaven and eternity. Though if there were
anything in the other world, it certainly would not be for such as they. It is
prophesied that Thou wilt come again in victory, Thou wilt come with Thy
chosen, the proud and strong, but we will say that they have only saved
themselves, but we have saved all. We are told that the harlot who sits upon
the beast, and holds in her hands the mystery, shall be put to shame, that the
weak will rise up again, and will rend her royal purple and will strip naked
her loathsome body. But then I will stand up and point out to Thee the thousand
millions of happy children who have known no sin. And we who have taken their
sins upon us for their happiness will stand up before Thee and say: "Judge
us if Thou canst and darest." Know that I fear Thee not. Know that I too
have been in the wilderness, I too have lived on roots and locusts, I too
prized the freedom with which Thou hast blessed men, and I too was striving to
stand among Thy elect, among the strong and powerful, thirsting "to make
up the number." But I awakened and would not serve madness. I turned back
and joined the ranks of those who have corrected Thy work. I left the proud and
went back to the humble, for the happiness of the humble. What I say to Thee
will come to pass, and our dominion will be built up. I repeat, to-morrow Thou
shalt see that obedient flock who at a sign from me will hasten to heap up the
hot cinders about the pile on which I shall burn Thee for coming to hinder us.
For if anyone has ever deserved our fires, it is Thou. To-morrow I shall burn
Thee. Dixi.'"
Ivan stopped. He was carried away as
he talked, and spoke with excitement; when he had finished, he suddenly smiled.
Alyosha had listened in silence;
towards the end he was greatly moved and seemed several times on the point of
interrupting, but restrained himself. Now his words came with a rush.
"But... that's absurd!" he
cried, flushing. "Your poem is in praise of Jesus, not in blame of Him—as
you meant it to be. And who will believe you about freedom? Is that the way to
understand it? That's not the idea of it in the Orthodox Church.... That's
Rome, and not even the whole of Rome, it's false-those are the worst of the
Catholics the Inquisitors, the Jesuits!... And there could not be such a
fantastic creature as your Inquisitor. What are these sins of mankind they take
on themselves? Who are these keepers of the mystery who have taken some curse
upon themselves for the happiness of mankind? When have they been seen? We know
the Jesuits, they are spoken ill of, but surely they are not what you describe?
They are not that at all, not at all.... They are simply the Romish army for
the earthly sovereignty of the world in the future, with the Pontiff of Rome
for Emperor... that's their ideal, but there's no sort of mystery or lofty
melancholy about it.... It's simple lust of power, of filthy earthly gain, of
domination-something like a universal serfdom with them as masters-that's all
they stand for. They don't even believe in God perhaps. Your suffering
Inquisitor is a mere fantasy."
"Stay, stay," laughed Ivan.
"how hot you are! A fantasy you say, let it be so! Of course it's a
fantasy. But allow me to say: do you really think that the Roman Catholic
movement of the last centuries is actually nothing but the lust of power, of
filthy earthly gain? Is that Father Paissy's teaching?"
"No, no, on the contrary, Father
Paissy did once say something rather the same as you... but of course it's not
the same, not a bit the same," Alyosha hastily corrected himself.
"A precious admission, in spite
of your 'not a bit the same.' I ask you why your Jesuits and Inquisitors have
united simply for vile material gain? Why can there not be among them one
martyr oppressed by great sorrow and loving humanity? You see, only suppose
that there was one such man among all those who desire nothing but filthy
material gain-if there's only one like my old Inquisitor, who had himself eaten
roots in the desert and made frenzied efforts to subdue his flesh to make
himself free and perfect. But yet all his life he loved humanity, and suddenly
his eyes were opened, and he saw that it is no great moral blessedness to
attain perfection and freedom, if at the same time one gains the conviction
that millions of God's creatures have been created as a mockery, that they will
never be capable of using their freedom, that these poor rebels can never turn
into giants to complete the tower, that it was not for such geese that the
great idealist dreamt his dream of harmony. Seeing all that he turned back and
joined—the clever people. Surely that could have happened?"
"Joined whom, what clever
people?" cried Alyosha, completely carried away. "They have no such
great cleverness and no mysteries and secrets.... Perhaps nothing but Atheism,
that's all their secret. Your Inquisitor does not believe in God, that's his
secret!"
"What if it is so! At last you
have guessed it. It's perfectly true, it's true that that's the whole secret,
but isn't that suffering, at least for a man like that, who has wasted his
whole life in the desert and yet could not shake off his incurable love of
humanity? In his old age he reached the clear conviction that nothing but the
advice of the great dread spirit could build up any tolerable sort of life for
the feeble, unruly, 'incomplete, empirical creatures created in jest.' And so,
convinced of this, he sees that he must follow the counsel of the wise spirit,
the dread spirit of death and destruction, and therefore accept lying and
deception, and lead men consciously to death and destruction, and yet deceive
them all the way so that they may not notice where they are being led, that the
poor blind creatures may at least on the way think themselves happy. And note,
the deception is in the name of Him in Whose ideal the old man had so fervently
believed all his life long. Is not that tragic? And if only one such stood at
the head of the whole army 'filled with the lust of power only for the sake of
filthy gain'—would not one such be enough to make a tragedy? More than that,
one such standing at the head is enough to create the actual leading idea of
the Roman Church with all its armies and Jesuits, its highest idea. I tell you
frankly that I firmly believe that there has always been such a man among those
who stood at the head of the movement. Who knows, there may have been some such
even among the Roman Popes. Who knows, perhaps the spirit of that accursed old
man who loves mankind so obstinately in his own way, is to be found even now in
a whole multitude of such old men, existing not by chance but by agreement, as
a secret league formed long ago for the guarding of the mystery, to guard it
from the weak and the unhappy, so as to make them happy. No doubt it is so, and
so it must be indeed. I fancy that even among the Masons there's something of
the same mystery at the bottom, and that that's why the Catholics so detest the
Masons as their rivals breaking up the unity of the idea, while it is so
essential that there should be one flock and one shepherd.... But from the way
I defend my idea I might be an author impatient of your criticism. Enough of
it."
"You are perhaps a Mason
yourself!" broke suddenly from Alyosha. "You don't believe in
God," he added, speaking this time very sorrowfully. He fancied besides
that his brother was looking at him ironically. "How does your poem
end?" he asked, suddenly looking down. "Or was it the end?"
"I meant to end it like this.
When the Inquisitor ceased speaking he waited some time for his Prisoner to
answer him. His silence weighed down upon him. He saw that the Prisoner had
listened intently all the time, looking gently in his face and evidently not
wishing to reply. The old man longed for him to say something, however bitter
and terrible. But He suddenly approached the old man in silence and softly
kissed him on his bloodless aged lips. That was all his answer. The old man
shuddered. His lips moved. He went to the door, opened it, and said to Him:
'Go, and come no more... come not at all, never, never!' And he let Him out
into the dark alleys of the town. The Prisoner went away."
"And the old man?"
"The kiss glows in his heart,
but the old man adheres to his idea."