Page:Dead Souls - A Poem by Nikolay Gogol - vol2.djvu/274

264, I might have made hundreds of people happy; that I might have helped poor artists, might have founded libraries and made collections. I have some taste and I know that in many respects I could have managed better than those of our own rich men who do all that sort of thing so stupidly. But now I see that that too is vanity and that there is not much sense in it. No, Afanasy Vassilyevitch, I am good for nothing, absolutely nothing, I tell you. I am not fit for any sort of work.'

'Listen, Pyotr Petrovitch! You pray and go to church, you miss neither matins nor vespers, I know that. Though you are not fond of early rising you get up early and go to service—you go at four o'clock in the morning when no one is getting up.'

'That is a different matter, Afanasy Vassilyevitch. I do that for the salvation of my soul, because I am convinced that thereby I do to some extent make up for my idle life, that however bad I may be, yet humble prayer and some self-denial has a value in the eyes of the Lord. I tell you that I pray, without faith,—but still I pray. I have a feeling that there is a Master on Whom everything depends, just as horses and cattle feel they have a rightful master.'

'So that you pray to please Him to Whom you pray and to save your soul, and that gives you strength and energy to get out of bed. Believe me, that if you would undertake your duties in the same way as you serve Him to Whom you pray,