ipping from
his wine-glass with relish.

"And if I've ceased to be a Christian, then I told no lie to the enemy
when they asked whether I was a Christian or not a Christian, seeing I had
already been relieved by God Himself of my Christianity by reason of the
thought alone, before I had time to utter a word to the enemy. And if I
have already been discharged, in what manner and with what sort of justice
can I be held responsible as a Christian in the other world for having
denied Christ, when, through the very thought alone, before denying Him I
had been relieved from my christening? If I'm no longer a Christian, then
I can't renounce Christ, for I've nothing then to renounce. Who will hold
an unclean Tatar responsible, Grigory Vassilyevitch, even in heaven, for
not having been born a Christian? And who would punish him for that,
considering that you can't take two skins off one ox? For God Almighty
Himself, even if He did make the Tatar responsible, when he dies would
give him the smallest possible punishment, I imagine (since he must be
punished), judging that he is not to blame if he has come into the world
an unclean heathen, from heathen parents. The Lord God can't surely take a
Tatar and say he was a Christian? That would mean that the Almighty would
tell a real untruth. And can the Lord of Heaven and earth tell a lie, even
in one word?"

Grigory was thunderstruck and looked at the orator, his eyes nearly
starting out of his head. Though he did not clearly understand what was
said, he had caught something in this rigmarole, and stood, looking like a
man who has just hit his head against a wall. Fyodor Pavlovitch emptied
his glass and went off into his shrill laugh.

"Alyosha! Alyosha! What do you say to that! Ah, you casuist! He must have
been with the Jesuits, somewhere, Ivan. Oh, you stinking Jesuit, who
taught you? But you're talking nonsense, you casuist, nonsense, nonsense,
nonsense. Don't cry, Grigory, we'll reduce him to smoke and ashes in a
moment. Tell me this, O ass; you may be right before your enemies, but you
have renounced your faith all the same in your own heart, and you say
yourself that in that very hour you became anathema accursed. And if once
you're anathema they won't pat you on the head for it in hell. What do you
say to that, my fine Jesuit?"

"There is no doubt that I have renounced it in my own heart, but there was
no special sin in that. Or if there was sin, it was the most ordinary."