could have
recalled something else. Take Christ, for instance: Christ responded
to reality by weeping, smiling, being sorrowful and moved to wrath,
even overcome by misery. He did not go to meet His sufferings with
a smile, He did not despise death, but prayed in the Garden of
Gethsemane that this cup might pass Him by."

Ivan Dmitritch laughed and sat down.

"Granted that a man's peace and contentment lie not outside but in
himself," he said, "granted that one must despise suffering and not
be surprised at anything, yet on what ground do you preach the
theory? Are you a sage? A philosopher?"

"No, I am not a philosopher, but everyone ought to preach it because
it is reasonable."

"No, I want to know how it is that you consider yourself competent
to judge of 'comprehension,' contempt for suffering, and so on.
Have you ever suffered? Have you any idea of suffering? Allow me
to ask you, were you ever thrashed in your childhood?"

"No, my parents had an aversion for corporal punishment."

"My father used to flog me cruelly; my father was a harsh, sickly
Government clerk with a long nose and a yellow neck. But let us
talk of you. No one has laid a finger on you all your life, no one
has scared you nor beaten you; you are as strong as a bull. You
grew up under your father's wing and studied at his expense, and
then you dropped at once into a sinecure. For more than twenty years
you have lived rent free with heating, lighting, and service all
provided, and had the right to work how you pleased and as much as
you pleased, even to do nothing. You were naturally a flabby, lazy
man, and so you have tried to arrange your life so that nothing
should disturb you or make you move. You have handed over your work
to the assistant and the rest of the rabble while you sit in peace
and warmth, save money, read, amuse yourself with reflections, with
all sorts of lofty nonsense, and" (Ivan Dmitritch looked at the
doctor's red nose) "with boozing; in fact, you have seen nothing
of life, you know absolutely nothing of it, and are only theoretically
acquainted with reality; you despise suffering and are surprised
at nothing for a very simple reason: vanity of vanities, the external
and the internal, contempt for life, for suffering and for death,
comprehension, true happiness--that's the philosophy that suits
the Russian sluggard best. You see a peasant beating his wife, for
instance. Why interfere? Let him beat her, they will both di