Page:Tolstoy - Essays and Letters.djvu/197

 LETTER ON NON-RESISTANCE 181

instructions what to do, and especially what not to do, lest he hinder the attainment of the very aims to ards which his 'labour should tend. For the rest he has full liberty given him. And, therefore, for a man who has grasped the Christian conception of life, the meaning of his life is j)erfectly plain and reasonable, nor can he have a moment's hesitation as to how he should act, or what he should do to fulfil the object for which lie lives.

And yet in spite of such a twofold indication (clear and indubitable to a man of Christian understanding) of what is the real aim and meaning of human life, and of what men should do and should not do, we find people (and people calling themselves Christians) who decide that, in such and such circumstances, men ought to abandon God^s law and reason's guidance and to act in opposition to them, because (according to their concep- tion) the effects of actions performed in submission to God's law may be detrimental or inconvenient.

According to the law contained alike in tradition, in our reason, and in our hearts, man should always do unto others as he would tliat they should do unto him ; he should always co-operate in the development of love and union among created beings. But, in the judg- ment of these far-sighted people, on the contrary, as long as in their opinion it is premature to obey this law, man should do violence — imprison or kill people — and thereby evoke anger and venom instead of loving union in the hearts of men. It is as though a brick- layer, set to do a particular task and knowing that he was co-operating with others to build a house, after receiving clear and precise instructions from the master himself how to build a certain wall, accepted orders from some fellow-bricklayers (who like himself knew neither the plan of tlie house, nor what would fit in with it) to cease building his wall, and, instead, to pull down a wall that other Avorkmen had erected.

Astonishing delusion ! A being who breathes to-day and has vanished to-morrow receives one defniite indubitable law to guide him through the brief term