If Aliosha had come to the conclusion that neither God nor immortality existed, he would immediately have become an atheist and a socialist. For socialism is not only a question of the working classes; it is above all, in its contemporary incarnation, a question of atheism, a question of the tower of Babel, which is constructed without God’s help, not to reach to the heavens, but to bring the heavens down to earth.
That’s why I like you so much. Your heart isn’t dead.
The language he used was that of a man who was sick and tired of the world he lived in – though he had much liking for his fellow men – and had resolved, for his part, to have no truck with injustice and compromises with the truth.
I had lived my life one way and I could just as well have lived it another.
Only today did his solitude become real, for only today did he feel band to it. And to have accepted that solitude, to know that henceforth he was the master of all his days to come, filled him with the melancholy that is attached to all greatness.
I’ve seen a lot of beautiful things with a heavy heart.
And when it comes down to it, you realize that no one is really capable of thinking of anyone else, even in the worst misfortune. Because thinking about someone really means thinking about that person minute by minute, not being distracted by anything – not housework, not a fly passing, not meals, not an urge to scratch oneself. But there are always flies and itches. This is why life is hard to live. And these people know that very well.
Men praise me, I dream a little, they insult me, I scarcely show surprise. Then I forget, and smile at the man who insulted me, or am too courteous in greeting the person I love.
Love is never strong enough to find the words befitting it. Thus he and his mother would always love eachother silently.
In certain situations, replying “nothing” when asked what one is thinking about may be pretense in a man. Those who are loved are well aware of this. But if that reply is sincere, if it symbolizes that odd state of soul in which the void becomes eloquent, in which the chain of daily gestures is broken, in which the heart vainly seeks the link that will connect it again, then it is as it were the first sign of absurdity.
They considered themselves free and no one will ever be free as long as there is plague, pestilence and famine.
We refuse to despair of mankind. Without having the unreasonable ambition to save men, we still want to serve them.
And despite the clamors and the violence, we tried to preserve in our hearts the memory of a happy sea, of a remembered hill, the smile of a beloved face.
Nos hacemos siempre una idea exagerada de lo que no conocemos.
Above all, don’t believe your friends when they ask you to be sincere with them. They merely hope you will encourage them in the good opinion they have of themselves by providing them with the additional assurance they will find in your promise of sincerity.
For three years,’ says Kirilov, ‘I sought the attribute of my divinity and I have found it. The attribute of my divinity is independence.’ Now can be seen the meaning of Kirilov’s premiss: ‘If God does not exist, I am god.’ To become god is merely to be free on this earth, not to serve an immortal being.
At the present time, I long only to sleep and to remain silent. I am sick of humanity.
Mistaken ideas always end in bloodshed, but in every case it is someone else’s blood. This is why our thinkers feel free to say just about anything.
Living with one’s passions amounts to living with one’s sufferings, which are the counterpoise, the corrective, the balance and the price. When a man has learned – and not on paper – how to remain alone with his suffering, how to overcome his longing to flee, the illusions that others may share, then he has little left to learn.
Why indeed should we carry on and why should we return? Our cup runneth over, and a mute, invincible madness rocks us to sleep. A day comes like this which draws everything to a close; we must then let ourselves sink, like those who swim until exhausted. What do we accomplish?