alleviation of the peasants," he says; "there is no difficulty for
them in that." When he is asked what he lives for, he replies, "To
pass the time." I always look on this man as on a mirror. I behold
in him myself and all my class. To pass through all the ranks
(tchini) in order to live for the purpose of passing the time, and
to receive an unlimited bank account, while the peasants, for whom
this is not difficult, because of the invention of machinery, do the
whole business,--this is the complete formula of the idiotic creed
of the people of our sphere in society.

When we inquire precisely what we are to do, surely, we ask nothing,
but merely assert--only not in such good faith as the Most Serene
Prince Blokhin, who has been promoted through all ranks, and lost
his mind--that we do not wish to do any thing.

He who will reflect for a moment cannot ask thus, because, on the
one hand, every thing that he uses has been made, and is made, by
the hands of men; and, on the other side, as soon as a healthy man
has awakened and eaten, the necessity of working with feet and hands
and brain makes itself felt. In order to find work and to work, he
need only not hold back: only a person who thinks work disgraceful-
-like the lady who requests her guest not to take the trouble to
open the door, but to wait until she can call a man for this
purpose--can put to himself the question, what he is to do.

The point does not lie in inventing work,--you can never get through
all the work that is to be done for yourself and for others,--but
the point lies in weaning one's self from that criminal view of life
in accordance with which I eat and sleep for my own pleasure; and in
appropriating to myself that just and simple view with which the