Page:Labour - The Divine Command, 1890.djvu/18

14 has a horror of useless efforts, and prefers to make shoes."

But this is far from being the spirit of the doctrine of Tolstoï and Bondareff. Physical labor is with them the highest duty, the essential character of man, and the true, the only mode of life. Without doubt, one must work to maintain the equilibrium between mind and body, but that is not the motive which led Tolstoï to the plough and the shoemaker's bench. He does not hold strongly the arguments of Jean-Jacques in favor of bodily labor. We must work with our hands because life consists in a battle with nature for the means of existence, and physical labor is the law of life. Man finds in the accomplishment of this duty a complete satisfaction for his bodily as well as his spiritual needs. To nourish, clothe, and care for himself and his family satisfies his bodily wants. To nourish, clothe, and care for others becomes a spiritual duty. No form of activity is legitimate that does not seek to gratify the primitive wants of man, for in these rests his very life.

Let us go further. Tolstoï is an idealist. Nature is what we ourselves make it. Nature in its true form is Mind, and the universal Mind is far above the individual personality. Let us recognize individuality as an illusion, and that we are working at an infinite task, which is infinitely beyond us. To put aside our personality and follow the path of renunciation and