Page:The Complete Works of Lyof N. Tolstoi - 11 (Crowell, 1899).djvu/532

 "Renunciation and acquiescence are less difficult to me than to others, for I wish nothing. I should wish only not to suffer, but Jesus at Gethsemane believed that he might offer the same prayer: let us join as he did these words, Nevertheless not my will but Thine be done, and let us wait."

Such he was on the eve of his death. He was not any the less frank and grave all through his journal, notwithstanding its beauty, and the refinement of his language, shown in many places and grown to be habitual with him. In the course of the whole thirty years of his journal he feels what we are all so apt to forget, that we are all condemned to death and our execution is only postponed. And this is what causes this book to be so frank, serious, and useful.

1893.