g unattainable to you. A man
grows in height by stretching himself upwards."
Now that he had ceased speaking of himself, Yozhov began to talk more
calmly, in a different voice. His voice was firm and resolute, and his
face assumed an expression of importance and sternness. He stood in the
centre of the room, his hand with outstretched fingers uplifted, and
spoke as though he were reading:
"Men are base because they strive for satiety. The well-fed man is an
animal because satiety is the self-contentedness of the body. And the
self-contentedness of the spirit also turns man into animal."
Again he started as though all his veins and muscles were suddenly
strained, and again he began to run about the room in seething
agitation.
"A self-contented man is the hardened swelling on the breast of society.
He is my sworn enemy. He fills himself up with cheap truths, with gnawed
morsels of musty wisdom, and he exists like a storeroom where a stingy
housewife keeps all sorts of rubbish which is absolutely unnecessary to
her, and worthless. If you touch such a man, if you open the door into
him, the stench of decay will be breathed upon you, and a stream of some
musty trash will be poured into the air you breathe. These unfortunate
people call themselves men of firm character, men of principles and
convictions. And no one cares to see that convictions are to them but
the clothes with which they cover the beggarly nakedness of their souls.
On the narrow brows of such people there always shines the inscription
so familiar to all: calmness and confidence. What a false inscription!
Just rub their foreheads with firm hand and then you will see the real
sign-board, which reads: 'Narrow mindedness and weakness of soul!'"
Foma watched Yozhov bustling about the room, and thought mournfully:
"Whom is he abusing? I can't understand; but I can see that he has been
terribly wounded."
"How many such people have I seen!" exclaimed Yozhov, with wrath and
terror. "How these little retail shops have multiplied in life! In
them you will find calico for shrouds, and tar, candy and borax for the
extermination of cockroaches, but you will not find anything fresh, hot,
wholesome! You come to them with an aching soul exhausted by loneliness;
you come, thirsting to hear something that has life in it. And they
offer to you some worm cud, ruminated book-thoughts, grown sour with
age. And these dry, stale thoughts are always so poor that, in orde
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