STYoPA. Why choose a middle course: an equipoise between the two? If it is right to do so--why not give away everything and die?
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. That would be splendid. Try to do it, and it will be well both for you and for others.
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. No, that is not clear, not simple. _C"est tire par les cheveux._[25]
[25] It"s too fine spun.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Well, I can"t help it, and it can"t be explained by argument. However, that is enough.
STYoPA. Yes, quite enough, and I also don"t understand it. [Exit].
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH [turns to Priest] Well, what impression did the book make on you?
PRIEST [agitated] How shall I put it? Well, the historic part is insufficiently worked out, and it is not fully convincing, or let us say, quite reliable; because the materials are, as a matter of fact, insufficient. Neither the Divinity of Christ, nor His lack of Divinity, can be proved historically; there is but one irrefragable proof....
During this conversation first the ladies and then Peter Semyonovich go out.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. You mean the Church?
PRIEST. Well, of course, the Church, and the evidence, let"s say, of reliable men--the Saints for instance.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Of course, it would be excellent if there existed a set of infallible people to confide in. It would be very desirable; but its desirability does not prove that they exist!
PRIEST. And I believe that just _that is_ the proof. The Lord could not in fact have exposed His law to the possibility of mutilation or misinterpretation, but must in fact have left a guardian of His truth to prevent that truth being mutilated.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Very well; but we first tried to prove the truth itself, and now we are trying to prove the reliability of the guardian of the truth.
PRIEST. Well here, as a matter of fact, we require faith.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Faith--yes, we need faith. We can"t do without faith. Not, however, faith in what other people tell us, but faith in what we arrive at ourselves, by our own thought, our own reason ...
faith in G.o.d, and in true and everlasting life.
PRIEST. Reason may deceive. Each of us has a different mind.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH [hotly] There, that is the most terrible blasphemy!
G.o.d has given us just one sacred tool for finding the truth--the only thing that can unite us all, and we do not trust it!
PRIEST. How can we trust in it, when there are contradictions?
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Where are the contradictions? That twice two are four; and that one should not do to others what one would not like oneself; and that everything has a cause? Truths of that kind we all acknowledge because they accord with all our reason. But that G.o.d appeared on Mount Sinai to Moses, or that Buddha flew up on a sunbeam, or that Mahomet went up into the sky, and that Christ flew there also--on matters of that kind we are all at variance.
PRIEST. No, we are not at variance, those of us who abide in the truth are all united in one faith in G.o.d, Christ.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. No, even there, you are not united, but have all gone asunder; so why should I believe you rather than I would believe a Buddhist Lama? Only because I happened to be born in your faith?
[The tennis players dispute] "Out!" "Not out!"
VaNYA. I saw it ...:
During the conversation, men-servants set the table again for tea and coffee.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. You say the Church unites. But, on the contrary, the worst dissensions have always been caused by the Church. "How often would I have gathered you as a hen gathers her chickens." ...
PRIEST. That was until Christ. But Christ did gather them all together.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Yes, Christ united; but we have divided: because we have understood him the wrong way round. He destroyed all Churches.
PRIEST. Did he not say: "Go, tell the Church."
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. It is not a question of words! Besides those words don"t refer to what we call "Church." It is the spirit of the teaching that matters. Christ"s teaching is universal, and includes all religions, and does not admit of anything exclusive; neither of the Resurrection nor the Divinity of Christ, nor the Sacraments--nor of anything that divides.
PRIEST. That, as a matter of fact, if I may say so, is your own interpretation of Christ"s teaching. But Christ"s teaching is all founded on His Divinity and Resurrection.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. That"s what is so dreadful about the Churches. They divide by declaring that they possess the full indubitable and infallible truth. They say: "It has pleased us and the Holy Ghost." That began at the time of the first Council of the Apostles. They then began to maintain that they had the full and _exclusive_ truth. You see, if I say there is a G.o.d: the first cause of the Universe, everyone can agree with me; and _such_ an acknowledgment of G.o.d will unite us; but if I say there is a G.o.d: Brahma, or Jehovah, or a Trinity, such a G.o.d divides us.
Men wish to unite, and to that end devise all means of union, but neglect the one indubitable means of union--the search for truth! It is as if people in an enormous building, where the light from above shone down into the centre, tried to unite in groups around lamps in different corners, instead of going towards the central light, where they would naturally all be united.
PRIEST. And how are the people to be guided--without any really definite truth?
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. That"s what is terrible! Each _one_ of us has to save _his own_ soul, and has to do G.o.d"s work _himself_, but instead of that we busy ourselves saving _other people_ and teaching _them_. And what do we teach them? We teach them now, at the end of the nineteenth century, that G.o.d created the world in six days, then caused a flood, and put all the animals in an ark, and all the rest of the horrors and nonsense of the Old Testament. And then that Christ ordered everyone to be baptized with water; and we make them believe in all the absurdity and meanness of an Atonement essential to salvation; and then that he rose up into the heavens which do not really exist, and there sat down at the right hand of the Father. We have got used to all this, but really it is dreadful! A child, fresh and ready to receive all that is good and true, asks us what the world is, and what its laws are; and we, instead of revealing to him the teaching of love and truth that has been given to us, carefully ram into his head all sorts of horrible absurdities and meannesses, ascribing them all to G.o.d. Is that not terrible? It is as great a crime as man can commit. And we--you and your Church--do this! Forgive me!
PRIEST. Yes, if one looks at Christ"s teaching from a rationalistic point of view, it is so.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Whichever way one looks, it is so. [Pause].
Enter Alexandra Ivanovna. Priest bows to take his leave.
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. Good-bye, Father. He will lead you astray. Don"t you listen to him.
PRIEST. No. Search the Scriptures! The matter is too important, as a matter of fact, to be--let"s say--neglected. [Exit].
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. Really, Nicholas, you have no pity on him! Though he is a priest, he is still only a boy, and can have no firm convictions or settled views....
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Give him time to settle down and petrify in falsehood? No! Why should I? Besides, he is a good, sincere man.
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. But what will become of him if he believes you?
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. He need not believe _me_. But if he saw the truth, it would be well for him and for everybody.
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. If it were really so good, everyone would be ready to believe you. As it is, no one believes you, and your wife least of all. She _can"t_ believe you.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Who told you that?
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. Well, just you try and explain it to her! She will never understand, nor shall I, nor anyone else in the world, that one must care for other people and abandon one"s own children. Go and try to explain that to Mary!
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. Yes, and Mary will certainly understand. Forgive me, Alexandra, but if it were not for other people"s influence, to which she is very susceptible, she would understand me and go with me.
ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. To beggar your children for the sake of drunken Yefim and his sort? Never! But if I have made you angry, please forgive me. I can"t help speaking out.
NICHOLAS IVaNOVICH. I am not angry. On the contrary, I am even glad you have spoken out and given me the opportunity--challenged me--to explain to Mary my whole outlook on life. On my way home to-day I was thinking of doing so, and I will speak to her at once; and you will see that she will agree, because she is wise and good.