by Leo Tolstoy
She pressed the lame little girl to her with one hand, while with the other she wiped the tears from her cheeks.
And Matryóna sighed, and said: ‘The proverb is true that says, “One may live without father or mother, but one cannot live without God.” ’
So they talked together, when suddenly the whole hut was lighted up as though by summer lightning from the corner where Michael sat. They all looked towards him and saw him sitting, his hands folded on his knees, gazing upwards and smiling.
X
THE woman went away with the girls. Michael rose from the bench, put down his work, and took off his apron. Then, bowing low to Simon and his wife, he said: ‘Farewell, masters. God has forgiven me. I ask your forgiveness, too, for anything done amiss.’
And they saw that a light shone from Michael. And Simon rose, bowed down to Michael, and said: ‘I see, Michael, that you are no common man, and I can neither keep you nor question you. Only tell me this: how is it that when I found you and brought you home, you were gloomy, and when my wife gave you food you smiled at her and became brighter? Then when the gentleman came to order the boots, you smiled again and became brighter still? And now, when this woman brought the little girls, you smiled a third time, and have become as bright as day? Tell me, Michael, why does your face shine so, and why did you smile those three times?’
And Michael answered: ‘Light shines from me because I have been punished, but now God has pardoned me. And I smiled three times, because God sent me to learn three truths, and I have learnt them. One I learnt when your wife pitied me, and that is why I smiled the first time. The second I learnt when the rich man ordered the boots, and then I smiled again. And now, when I saw those little girls, I learnt the third and last truth, and I smiled the third time.’
And Simon said, ‘Tell me, Michael, what did God punish you for? and what were the three truths? that I, too, may know them.’
And Michael answered: ‘God punished me for disobeying Him. I was an angel in heaven and disobeyed God. God sent me to fetch a woman’s soul. I flew to earth, and saw a sick woman lying alone, who had just given birth to twin girls. They moved feebly at their mother’s side, but she could not lift them to her breast. When she saw me, she understood that God had sent me for her soul, and she wept and said: “Angel of God! My husband has just been buried, killed by a falling tree. I have neither sister, nor aunt, nor mother: no one to care for my orphans. Do not take my soul! Let me nurse my babes, feed them, and set them on their feet before I die. Children cannot live without father or mother.” And I hearkened to her. I placed one child at her breast and gave the other into her arms, and returned to the Lord in heaven. I flew to the Lord, and said: “I could not take the soul of the mother. Her husband was killed by a tree; the woman has twins, and prays that her soul may not be taken. She says: ‘Let me nurse and feed my children, and set them on their feet. Children cannot live without father or mother.’ I have not taken her soul.” And God said: “Go – take the mother’s soul, and learn three truths: Learn What dwells in man, What is not given to man, and What men live by. When thou hast learnt these things, thou shalt return to heaven.” So I flew again to earth and took the mother’s soul. The babes dropped from her breasts. Her body rolled over on the bed and crushed one babe, twisting its leg. I rose above the village, wishing to take her soul to God; but a wind seized me, and my wings drooped and dropped off. Her soul rose alone to God, while I fell to earth by the roadside.’
XI
AND Simon and Matryóna understood who it was that had lived with them, and whom they had clothed and fed. And they wept with awe and with joy. And the angel said: ‘I was alone in the field, naked. I had never known human needs, cold and hunger, till I became a man. I was famished, frozen, and did not know what to do. I saw, near the field I was in, a shrine built for God, and I went to it hoping to find shelter. But the shrine was locked, and I could not enter. So I sat down behind the shrine to shelter myself at least from the wind. Evening drew on. I was hungry, frozen, and in pain. Suddenly I heard a man coming along the road. He carried a pair of boots, and was talking to himself. For the first time since I became a man I saw the mortal face of a man, and his face seemed terrible to me and I turned from it. And I heard the man talking to himself of how to cover his body from the cold in winter, and how to feed wife and children. And I thought: “I am perishing of cold and hunger, and here is a man thinking only of how to clothe himself and his wife, and how to get bread for themselves. He cannot help me.” When the man saw me he frowned and became still more terrible, and passed me by on the other side. I despaired; but suddenly I heard him coming back. I looked up, and did not recognize the same man: before, I had seen death in his face; but now he was alive, and I recognized in him the presence of God. He came up to me, clothed me, took me with him, and brought me to his home. I entered the house; a woman came to meet us and began to speak. The woman was still more terrible than the man had been; the spirit of death came from her mouth; I could not breathe for the stench of death that spread around her. She wished to drive me out into the cold, and I knew that if she did so she would die. Suddenly her husband spoke to her of God, and the woman changed at once. And when she brought me food and looked at me, I glanced at her and saw that death no longer dwelt in her; she had become alive, and in her too I saw God.
‘Then I remembered the first lesson God had set me: “Learn what dwells in man.” And I understood that in man dwells Love! I was glad that God had already begun to show me what He had promised, and I smiled for the first time. But I had not yet learnt all. I did not yet know What is not given to man, and What men live by.
‘I lived with you, and a year passed. A man came to order boots that should wear for a year without losing shape or cracking. I looked at him, and suddenly, behind his shoulder, I saw my comrade – the angel of death. None but me saw that angel; but I knew him, and knew that before the sun set he would take that rich man’s soul. And I thought to myself, “The man is making preparations for a year, and does not know that he will die before evening.” And I remembered God’s second saying, “Learn what is not given to man.”
‘What dwells in man I already knew. Now I learnt what is not given him. It is not given to man to know his own needs. And I smiled for the second time. I was glad to have seen my comrade angel – glad also that God had revealed to me the second saying.
‘But I still did not know all. I did not know What men live by. And I lived on, waiting till God should reveal to me the last lesson. In the sixth year came the girl-twins with the woman; and I recognized the girls, and heard how they had been kept alive. Having heard the story, I thought, “Their mother besought me for the children’s sake, and I believed her when she said that children cannot live without father or mother; but a stranger has nursed them, and has brought them up.” And when the woman showed her love for the children that were not her own, and wept over them, I saw in her the living God, and understood What men live by. And I knew that God had revealed to me the last lesson, and had forgiven my sin. And then I smiled for the third time.’
XII
AND the angel’s body was bared, and he was clothed in light so that eye could not look on him; and his voice grew louder, as though it came not from him but from heaven above. And the angel said:
‘I have learnt that all men live not by care for themselves, but by love.
‘It was not given to the mother to know what her children needed for their life. Nor was it given to the rich man to know what he himself needed. Nor is it given to any man to know whether, when evening comes, he will need boots for his body or slippers for his corpse.
‘I remained alive when I was a man, not by care of myself, but because love was present in a passer-by, and because he and his wife pitied and loved me. The orphans remained alive, not because of their mother’s care, but because there was love in the heart of a woman a stranger to them, who pitied and loved them. And all men live not by the thought they spend on their own we
lfare, but because love exists in man.
‘I knew before that God gave life to men and desires that they should live; now I understood more than that.
‘I understood that God does not wish men to live apart, and therefore he does not reveal to them what each one needs for himself; but he wishes them to live united, and therefore reveals to each of them what is necessary for all.
‘I have now understood that though it seems to men that they live by care for themselves, in truth it is love alone by which they live. He who has love, is in God, and God is in him, for God is love.’
And the angel sang praise to God, so that the hut trembled at his voice. The roof opened, and a column of fire rose from earth to heaven. Simon and his wife and children fell to the ground. Wings appeared upon the angel’s shoulders, and he rose into the heavens.
And when Simon came to himself the hut stood as before, and there was no one in it but his own family.
MEMOIRS OF A MADMAN
20th October 1883.
TO-DAY I was taken to the Provincial Government Board to be certified. Opinions differed. They disputed, and finally decided that I was not insane – but they arrived at this decision only because during the examination I did my utmost to restrain myself and not give myself away. I did not speak out, because I am afraid of the madhouse, where they would prevent me from doing my mad work. So they came to the conclusion that I am subject to hallucinations and something else, but am of sound mind.
They came to that conclusion, but I myself know that I am mad. A doctor prescribed a treatment for me, and assured me that if I would follow his instructions exactly all would be right – all that troubled me would pass. Ah, what would I not give that it might pass! The torment is too great. I will tell in due order how and from what this medical certification came about – how I went mad and how I betrayed myself.
Up to the age of thirty-five I lived just as everybody else does and nothing strange was noticed about me. Perhaps in early childhood, before the age of ten, there was at times something resembling my present condition, but only by fits, and not continually as now. Moreover in childhood it used to affect me rather differently. For instance I remember that once when going to bed, at the age of five or six, my nurse Eupraxia, a tall thin woman who wore a brown dress and a cap and had flabby skin under her chin, was undressing me and lifting me up to put me into my cot. ‘I will get into bed by myself – myself!’ I said, and stepped over the side of the cot.
‘Well, lie down then. Lie down, Fédya! Look at Mítya. He’s a good boy and is lying down already,’ she said, indicating my brother with a jerk of her head.
I jumped into the bed still holding her hand, and then let it go, kicked about under my bed-clothes, and wrapped myself up. And I had such a pleasant feeling. I grew quiet and thought: ‘I love Nurse; Nurse loves me and Mítya; and I love Mítya, and Mítya loves me and Nurse. Nurse loves Tarás, and I love Tarás, and Mítya loves him. And Tarás loves me and Nurse. And Mamma loves me and Nurse, and Nurse loves Mamma and me and Papa – and everybody loves everybody and everybody is happy!’
Then suddenly I heard the housekeeper run in and angrily shout something about a sugar-basin, and nurse answering indignantly that she had not taken it. And I felt pained, frightened, and bewildered, and horror, cold horror, seized me, and I hid my head under the bed-clothes but felt no better in the dark.
I also remembered how a serf-boy was once beaten in my presence, how he screamed, and how dreadful Fóka’s face looked when he was beating the boy. ‘Then you won’t do it any more, you won’t?’ he kept repeating as he went on beating. The boy cried, ‘I won’t!’ but Fóka still repeated, ‘You won’t!’ and went on beating him.
And then it came upon me! I began to sob, and went on so that they could not quiet me for a long time. That sobbing and despair were the first attacks of my present madness.
I remember another attack when my aunt told us about Christ. She told the story and was about to go away, but we said: ‘Tell us some more about Jesus Christ!’
‘No, I have no time now,’ she said.
‘Yes, do tell us!’
Mítya also asked her to, and my aunt began to repeat what she had told us. She told us how they crucified, beat, and tortured him, and how he went on praying and did not reproach them.
‘Why did they torment him, Auntie?’
‘They were cruel people.’
‘But why, when he was good?’
‘There, that’s enough. It’s past eight! Do you hear?’
‘Why did they beat him? He forgave them, then why did they hit him? Did it hurt him, Auntie? Did it hurt?’
‘That will do! I’m going to have tea now.’
‘But perhaps it isn’t true and they didn’t beat him?’
‘Now, now, that will do!’
‘No, no! Don’t go away!’
And again I was overcome by it. I sobbed and sobbed, and began knocking my head against the wall.
That was how it befell me in my childhood. But by the time I was fourteen, and from the time the instincts of sex were aroused and I yielded to vice, all that passed away and I became a boy like other boys, like all the rest of us reared on rich, overabundant food, effeminate, doing no physical work, surrounded by all possible temptations that inflamed sensuality, and among other equally spoilt children. Boys of my own age taught me vice, and I indulged in it. Later on that vice was replaced by another, and I began to know women. And so, seeking enjoyments and finding them, I lived till the age of thirty-five. I was perfectly well and there were no signs of my madness.
Those twenty years of my healthy life passed for me so that I can hardly remember anything of them, and now recall them with difficulty and disgust. Like all mentally healthy boys of our circle I entered the high school and afterwards the university, where I completed the course of law-studies. Then I was in the Civil Service for a short time, and then I met my present wife, married, had a post in the country and, as it is called, ‘brought up’ our children, managed the estates, and was Justice of the Peace.
In the tenth year of my married life I again had an attack – the first since my childhood.
My wife and I had saved money – some inherited by her and some from the bonds I, like other landowners, received from the Government at the time of the emancipation of the serfs – and we decided to buy an estate. I was much interested, as was proper, in the growth of our property and in increasing it in the shrewdest way – better than other people. At that time I inquired everywhere where there were estates for sale, and read all the advertisements in the papers. I wanted to buy an estate so that the income from it, or the timber on it, should cover the whole purchase price and I should get it for nothing. I looked out for some fool who did not understand business, and thought I had found such a man.
An estate with large forests was being sold in Pénza province. From all I could learn about it, it seemed that its owner was just such a fool as I wanted and the timber would cover the whole cost of the estate. So I got ready and set out.
We (my servant and I) travelled at first by rail and then by road in a post-chaise. The journey was a very pleasant one for me. My servant, a young good-natured fellow, was in just as good spirits as I. We saw new places and met new people and enjoyed ourselves. To reach our destination we had to go about a hundred and forty miles, and decided to go without stopping except to change horses. Night came and we still went on. We grew drowsy. I fell asleep, but suddenly awoke feeling that there was something terrifying. As often happens, I woke up thoroughly alert and feeling as if sleep had gone for ever. ‘Why am I going? Where am I going to?’ I suddenly asked myself. It was not that I did not like the idea of buying an estate cheaply, but it suddenly occurred to me that there was no need for me to travel all that distance, that I should die here in this strange place, and I was filled with dread. Sergéy, my servant, woke up, and I availed myself of the opportunity to talk to him. I spoke about that part of the country, he replied and joked,
but I felt depressed. I spoke about our folks at home, and of the business before us, and I was surprised that his answers were so cheerful. Everything seemed pleasant and amusing to him while it nauseated me. But for all that while we were talking I felt easier. But besides everything seeming wearisome and uncanny, I began to feel tired and wished to stop. It seemed to me that I should feel better if I could enter a house, see people, drink tea, and above all have some sleep.
We were nearing the town of Arzamás.
‘Shall we put up here and rest a bit?’
‘Why not? Splendid!’