In search of the miraculous

on the obyvatel and in general despise the virtues of the obyvatel. But they only show by this their own personal unsuitability for any way whatever. Because no way can begin from a level lower than the obyvatel. This is very often lost sight of on people who are unable to organize their own personal lives, who are too weak to struggle with and conquer life, dream of the ways, or what they consider are ways, because they think it will be easier for them than life and because this, so to speak. Justifies their weakness and their inadaptability. A man who can be a good obyvatel is much more helpful from the point of view of the way than a 'tramp' who thinks himself much higher than an obyvatel. I call 'tramps' all the so-called 'intelligentsia'— artists, poets, any kind of 'bohemian' in general, who despises the obyvatel and who at the same time would be unable to exist without him. Ability to orientate oneself in life is a very useful quality from the point of view of work. A good obyvatel should be able to support at least twenty persons by his own labor. What is a man worth who is unable to do this?'

'What does obyvatel actually mean?' asked somebody. 'Can it be said that an obyvatel is a good citizen?'

'Ought an obyvatel to be patriotic?' someone else asked. 'Let us suppose there is war. What attitude should an obyvatel have towards war?'

'There can be different wars and there can be different patriots,' said G. 'You all still believe in words. An obyvatel, if he is a good obyvatel, does not believe in words. He realizes how much idle talk is hidden behind them. People who shout about their patriotism are psychopaths for him and he looks upon them as such.'

'And how would an obyvatel look upon pacifists or upon people who refuse to go to the war?'

'Equally as lunatics! They are probably still worse.'

On another occasion in connection with the same question G. said:

'A good deal is incomprehensible to you because you do not take into account the meaning of some of the most simple words, for instance,

' you have never thought what to be serious means. Try to give yourselves an answer to the question what being serious means.'

'To have a serious attitude towards things,' someone said.

'That is exactly what everybody thinks, actually it is exactly the reverse,' said G. 'To have a serious attitude towards things does not at all mean being serious because the principal question is, towards what things? Very many people have a serious attitude towards trivial things. Can they be called serious? Of course not.

'The mistake is that the concept 'serious' is taken conditionally. One thing is serious for one man and another thing for another man. In reality seriousness is one of the concepts which can never and under no circumstances be taken conditionally. Only one thing is serious for all people at all times. A man may be more aware of it or less aware of it but the seriousness of things will not alter on this account.

'If a man could understand all the horror of the lives of ordinary people who are turning round in a circle of insignificant interests and insignificant aims, if he could understand what they are losing, he would understand that there can be only one thing that is serious for him—to escape from the general law, to be free. What can be serious for a man in prison who is condemned to death? Only one thing: How to save himself, how to escape: nothing else is serious.

'When I say that an obyvatel is more serious than a 'tramp' or a 'lunatic,' I mean by this that, accustomed to deal with real values, an obyvatel values the possibilities of the 'ways' and the possibilities of 'liberation' or 'salvation' better and quicker than a man who is accustomed all his life to a circle of imaginary values, imaginary interests, and imaginary possibilities.

'People who are not serious for the obyvatel are people who live by fantasies, chiefly by the fantasy that they are able to do something. The obyvatel knows that they only deceive people, promise them God knows what, and that actually they are simply arranging affairs for themselves—or they are lunatics, which is still worse, in other words they believe everything that people say.'

'To what category do politicians belong who speak contemptuously about 'obyvatel,' 'obyvatels' opinions,' 'obyvatels' interests'?' someone asked.

'They are the worst kind of obyvatels,' said G., 'that is, obyvatels without any positive redeeming features, or they are charlatans, lunatics, or knaves.'

'But may there not be honest and decent people among politicians?' someone asked.

'Certainly there may be,' said G., 'but in this case they are not prac­tical people, they are dreamers, and they will be used by other people as screens to cover their own obscure affairs.

'The obyvatel perhaps may not know it in a philosophical way, that is to say, he is not able to formulate it, but he knows that things 'do themselves' simply through his own practical shrewdness, therefore, in his heart, he laughs at people who think, or who want to assure him, that they signify anything, that anything depends on their decisions, that they can change or, in general, do anything. This for him is not being serious. And an understanding of what is not serious can help him to value that which is serious.'

We often returned to questions on the difficulties of the way. Our own experience of communal life and work constantly threw us up against newer and newer difficulties that lay in ourselves.

'The whole thing is in being ready to sacrifice one's freedom,' said G. 'A man consciously and unconsciously struggles for freedom as he imagines it and this, more than anything else, prevents him from attaining real freedom. But a man who is capable of attaining anything comes sooner or later to the conclusion that his freedom is illusion and he agrees to sacrifice this illusion. He voluntarily becomes a slave. He does what he is told, says what he is told, and thinks what he is told. He is not afraid of losing anything because he knows that he has nothing. And in this way he acquires everything. Everything in him that was real in his understanding, in his sympathies, tastes, and desires, all comes back to him accompanied by new things which he did not have and could not have had before, together with a feeling of unity and will within him. But to arrive at this point, a man must pass through the hard way of slavery and obedience. And if he wants results he must obey not only outwardly but inwardly. This requires a great determination, and determination requires a great understanding of the fact that there is no other way, that a man can do nothing himself, but that at the same time, something has to be done.

'When a man comes to the conclusion that he cannot, and does not desire, to live any longer in the way he has lived till then; when he really sees everything that his life is made up of and decides to work, he must be truthful with himself in order not to fall into a still worse position. Because there is nothing worse than to begin work on oneself and then leave it and find oneself between two stools; it is much better not to begin. And in order not to begin in vain or risk being deceived on one's own account a man should test his decision many times. And principally he must know how far he is willing to go, what he is willing to sacrifice. There is nothing more easy to say than everything. A man can never sacrifice everything and this can never be required of him. But

he must define exactly what he is willing to sacrifice and not bargain about it afterwards. Or it will be the same with him as with the wolf in the Armenian fairy tale. 'Do you know the Armenian fairy tale of the wolf and the sheep?

'Once there lived a wolf who slaughtered a great many sheep and reduced many people to tears.

'At length, I do not know why, he suddenly felt qualms of conscience and began to repent his life; so he decided to reform and to slaughter no more sheep.

'In order to do this seriously he went to a priest and asked him to hold a thanksgiving service.

'The priest began the service and the wolf stood weeping and praying in the church. The service was long. The wolf had slaughtered many of the priest's sheep, therefore the priest prayed earnestly that the wolf would indeed reform. Suddenly the wolf looked through a window and saw that sheep were being driven home. He began to fidget but the priest went on and on without end.

'At last the wolf could contain himself no longer and he shouted:

''Finish it, priest! Or all the sheep will be driven home and I shall be left without supper!'

'This is a very good fairy tale because it describes man very well. He is ready to sacrifice everything, but after all today's dinner is a different matter.