Part 9

“Christian anarchy is a narrow definition of the Christian conception of the world, but anarchy follows certainly from Christianity in its application to social life.”

_September 3rd._ Tolstoi again spoke about the old German mystic, Angelus Silesius. Tolstoi asked some one to fetch his book (a large old volume) and read aloud several aphorisms, translating them as he read. When he came to the passage: “If God did not love Himself in us, we could neither love ourselves, nor God,” Tolstoi exclaimed:

“Ah, how well that’s said!”

Referring to some account in the papers of a conversation with him, Tolstoi said:

“If I were to live for another eighty years, and were never to cease talking, I could not manage to say all the sayings that are attributed to me.”

_September 6th._ Tolstoi said, with reference to the addresses and congratulations on his eightieth birthday (August 28th, 1908) which keep on coming:

“I believe I am right in saying that I have no vanity, but I can’t help being touched involuntarily. And yet, at my age, I live so far away from all this, it is all so unnecessary and so humiliating. Only one thing is necessary, the inner life of the spirit.”

On August 29th, when more than two thousand telegrams of congratulation arrived, Tolstoi said:

“I feel with joy that I have utterly lost the power of being interested in all this. In the past, I remember, I experienced a feeling of pride; I was glad at my success. But now--and I think it is not false modesty--it is a matter of absolute indifference to me. Perhaps it is because I have had too much success. It is like sweets: if you have too many, you feel surfeited. But one thing is pleasant: in nearly all the letters, congratulations, addresses, the same thing is repeated--it has simply become a truism--that I have destroyed religious delusions and opened the way for the search after truth. If it is true, it is just what I have wanted and tried to do all my life, and this is very dear to me.”

FOOTNOTE:

[14] Gregory Ivanovich Chertkov (1828-1884), Adjutant-General.

1909

_February 10th._ Once in the winter Sophie Andreevna in Tolstoi’s presence criticized V. G. Chertkov bitterly, which, as usual, pained him very much. This was in the morning. In the middle of the conversation Tolstoi got up and went into his room.

Some time later he came into the dining-room, stood at the door, and said in an agitated voice:

“There is an old nurse in our house. I scarcely know her, but I love her because she loves Sasha, and when there is nothing like that in a house, there is no real love.” ...

After saying this, Tolstoi turned and quietly went to his room.

To-night Tolstoi said:

“When one listens to music, it agitates, excites, elates, but one does not think. But when I play patience in my room, the finest thoughts come to me.”

During work, especially if he found some difficulty, Tolstoi used to play patience. This was his habit throughout his life. When he was writing Part III. of _Resurrection_, Tolstoi was undecided for a long time about the fate of Katyusha Maslov. Now he decided that Nekhlyudov should marry her, now that he should not. At last he decided to play a game of patience: if the patience came out, Nekhlyudov should marry her; if not, then he should not marry her. The patience did not come out. Once Tolstoi told me that he had found a passage in a book, which he was writing, very difficult. He hesitated for a long time what to do, but made up his mind and wrote it. Then he decided to test it by means of a game of patience; if the patience came out, that meant that what he had written was good; if it did not come out, then it was bad. The patience did not come out, and Tolstoi said to himself: “Never mind, it is good as it is!” and he left it as he had written it.

_May 24th._ Tolstoi was speaking about Dietrich’s German book on Goethe. The author sent him the book and asked him his opinion.

Tolstoi said:

“It is amazing! So far back as 1824 Goethe wrote that sincerity was become almost impossible in art, because of the multitude of newspapers, journals, and reviews. The artist reads them, involuntarily pays attention to them, and cannot be perfectly sincere. What would he say if he lived now!”

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