Not long after visiting his mothers grave Alyosha suddenly announced that he wanted to enter the monastery, and that the monks were willing to receive him as a novice. He explained that this was his strong desire, and that he was solemnly asking his consent as his father. The old man knew that the elder Zossima, who was living in the monastery hermitage, had made a special impression upon his gentle boy.
That is the most honest monk among them, of course, he observed, after listening in thoughtful silence to Alyosha, and seeming scarcely surprised at his request. Hm!So thats where you want to be, my gentle boy?
He was half drunk, and suddenly he grinned his slow halfdrunken grin, which was not without a certain cunning and tipsy slyness. Hm!I had a presentiment that you would end in something like this. Would you believe it? You were making straight for it. Well, to be sure you have your own two thousand. Thats a dowry for you. And Ill never desert you, my angel. And Ill pay whats wanted for you there, if they ask for it. But, of course, if they dont ask, why should we worry them? What do you say? You know, you spend money like a canary, two grains a week. Hm! Do you know that near one monastery theres a place outside the town where every baby knows there are none but the monks wives living, as they are called. Thirty women, I believe. I have been there myself. You know, its interesting in its own way, of course, as a variety. The worst of it is its awfully Russian. There are no French women there. Of course they could get them fast enough, they have plenty of money. If they get to hear of it theyll come along. Well, theres nothing of that sort here, no monks wives, and two hundred monks. Theyre honest. They keep the fasts. I admit it. Hm. So you want to be a monk? And do you know Im sorry to lose you, Alyosha; would you believe it, Ive really grown fond of you? Well, its a good opportunity. Youll pray for us sinners; we have sinned too much here. Ive always been thinking who would pray for me, and whether theres any one in the world to do it. My dear boy, Im awfully stupid about that. You wouldnt believe it. Awfully. You see, however stupid I am about it, I keep thinking, I keep thinkingfrom time to time, of course, not all the while. Its impossible, I think, for the devils to forget to drag me down to hell with their hooks when I die. Then I wonderhooks? Where would they get them? What of? Iron hooks? Where do they forge them? Have they a foundry there of some sort? The monks in the monastery probably believe that theres a ceiling in hell, for instance. Now Im ready to believe in hell, but without a ceiling. It makes it more refined, more enlightened, more Lutheran that is. And, after all, what does it matter whether it has a ceiling or hasnt? But, do you know, theres a damnable question involved in it? If theres no ceiling there can be no hooks, and if there are no hooks it all breaks down, which is unlikely again, for then there would be none to drag me down to hell, and if they dont drag me down what justice is there in the world? Il faudrait les inventer, those hooks, on purpose for me alone, for, if you only knew, Alyosha, what a blackguard I am.
But there are no hooks there, said Alyosha, looking gently and seriously at his father.
Yes, yes, only the shadows of hooks, I know, I know. Thats how a Frenchman described hell: Jai bu lombre dun cocher qui avec lombre dune brosse frottait lombre dune carrosse. How do you know there are no hooks, darling? When youve lived with the monks youll sing a different tune. But go and get at the truth there, and then come and tell me. Anyway its easier going to the other world if one knows what there is there. Besides, it will be more seemly for you with the monks than here with me, with a drunken old man and young harlots though youre like an angel, nothing touches you. And I dare say nothing will touch you there. Thats why I let you go, because I hope for that. Youve got all your wits about you. You will burn and you will burn out; you will be healed and come back again. And I will wait for you. I feel that youre the only creature in the world who has not condemned me. My dear boy, I feel it, you know. I cant help feeling it.
And he even began blubbering. He was sentimental. He was wicked and sentimental.
Chapter V.
Elders
Some of my readers may imagine that my young man was a sickly, ecstatic, poorly developed creature, a pale, consumptive dreamer. On the contrary, Alyosha was at this time a wellgrown, redcheeked, cleareyed lad of nineteen, radiant with health. He was very handsome, too, graceful, moderately tall, with hair of a dark brown, with a regular, rather long, ovalshaped face, and wideset dark gray, shining eyes; he was very thoughtful, and apparently very serene. I shall be told, perhaps, that red cheeks are not incompatible with fanaticism and mysticism; but I fancy that Alyosha was more of a realist than any one. Oh! no doubt, in the monastery he fully believed in miracles, but, to my thinking, miracles are never a stumblingblock to the realist. It is not miracles that dispose realists to belief. The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Even if he admits it, he admits it as a fact of nature till then unrecognized by him. Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from faith. If the realist once believes, then he is bound by his very realism to admit the miraculous also. The Apostle Thomas said that he would not believe till he saw, but when he did see he said, My Lord and my God! Was it the miracle forced him to believe? Most likely not, but he believed solely because he desired to believe and possibly he fully believed in his secret heart even when he said, I do not believe till I see.