Page:The Complete Works of Lyof N. Tolstoi - 11 (Crowell, 1899).djvu/561

Rh the same traditions. There was a remarkable absence of consistency in the lives of all these men. Together with a sincere and ardent desire for good, there was an utter looseness of personal desire, which, they thought, could not hinder the living of a good life, nor the performance of good, and even great, deeds. They put unkneaded loaves into a cold oven, and believed that bread would be baked. And then, when, with advancing years, they began to remark that the bread did not bake, i.e. that no good came of their lives, they saw in this something peculiarly tragic.

And the tragedy of such lives is indeed terrible. And this same tragedy that appeared in the lives of Herzen, Ogaref, and others of their time, exists to-day in those of very many so-called educated people, who hold the same views. A man desires to lead a good life, but that consecutiveness which is indispensable for this is lost in the society in which he lives. As, fifty years ago, Ogaref, Herzen, and others, so also the majority of men of the present day are persuaded that to lead an effeminate life, to eat sweet and fat dishes, delighting oneself in every way and satisfying all one's desires, does not hinder one from living a good life. But as it is evident that a righteous life in their case does not result, they give themselves up to pessimism, and say, "Such is the tragical fate of man."

What is also strange about the case is that these people know that the distribution of pleasures among men is unequal, and they regard this inequality as an evil and wish to correct it, and yet they do not cease to strive toward the augmentation of their pleasures, i.e. toward the augmentation of the inequality of the distribution of pleasures. In acting thus, these people are like men who, having entered before others into an orchard, hasten to gather all the fruit they can lay their hands on ; and yet would like to organize a more equal distribution of the fruit of the orchard between themselves and the late-comers, while they continue to pluck all the fruit they come across.