It is said that death always comes in due time. Evidently, that
time had not yet arrived for Max, for he remained alive--that is, he
ate, drank, walked, borrowed money and did not return it, and
altogether he showed by a series of psycho-physiological acts that he
was a living being, possessing a stomach, a will, and a mind--but his
soul was dead, or, to be more exact, it was absorbed in lethargic
sleep. The sound of human speech reached his ears, his eyes saw
tears and laughter, but all that did not stir a single echo, a single
emotion in his soul. I do not know what space of time had elapsed.
It may have been one year, and it may have been ten years, for the
length of such intermissions in life depends on how quickly the actor
succeeds in changing his costume.

One beautiful day--it was Wednesday or Thursday--Max awakened
completely. A careful and guarded liquidation of his spiritual
property made it clear that a fair piece of Max's soul, the part
which contained his love for woman and for his friends, was dead,
like a paralysis-stricken hand or foot. But what remained was,
nevertheless, enough for life. That was love for and faith in
mankind. Then Max, having renounced personal happiness, started to
work for the happiness of others.

That was a new phase--he believed.

All the evil that is tormenting the world seemed to him to be
concentrated in a "red flower," in one red flower. It was but
necessary to tear it down, and the incessant, heart-rending cries and
moans which rise to the indifferent sky from all points of the earth,
like its natural breathing, would be silenced. The evil of the