Do not be so excited. A
fancy, you say; be it so! Of course, it is a fancy. But stop. Do
you really imagine that all this Catholic movement during the
last centuries is naught but a desire for power for the mere
purpose of 'mean pleasures'? Is this what your Father Paissiy
taught you?"

"No, no, quite the reverse, for Father Paissiy once told me
something very similar to what you yourself say, though, of
course, not that--something quite different," suddenly added
Alexis, blushing.

"A precious piece of information, notwithstanding your 'not
that.' I ask you, why should the Inquisitors and the Jesuits of
your imagination live but for the attainment of 'mean material
pleasures?' Why should there not be found among them one single
genuine martyr suffering under a great and holy idea and loving
humanity with all his heart? Now let us suppose that among all
these Jesuits thirsting and hungering but after 'mean material
pleasures' there may be one, just one like my old Inquisitor, who
had himself fed upon roots in the wilderness, suffered the
tortures of damnation while trying to conquer flesh, in order to
become free and perfect, but who had never ceased to love
humanity, and who one day prophetically beheld the truth; who saw
as plain as he could see that the bulk of humanity could never be
happy under the old system, that it was not for them that the
great Idealist had come and died and dreamt of His Universal
Harmony. Having realized that truth, he returned into the world
and joined--intelligent and practical people. Is this so
impossible?"

"Joined whom? What intelligent and practical people?" exclaimed
Alyosha quite excited. "Why should they be more intelligent than
other men, and what secrets and mysteries can they have? They
have neither. Atheism and infidelity is all the secret they have.
Your Inquisitor does not believe in God, and that is all the
Mystery there is in it!"

"It may be so. You have guessed rightly there. And it is so, and
that is his whole secret; but is this not the acutest sufferings
for such a man as he, who killed all his young life in asceticism
in the desert, and yet could not cure himself of his love towards
his fellowmen? Toward the end of his life he becomes convinced
that it is only by following the advice of the great and terrible
spirit that the fate of these millions of weak rebels, these
'half-finished samples of humanity created in mockery' can be
made tolerable. And once co