Page:Tolstoy - Pamphlets.djvu/16

Rh it is impossible to oblige every one to accept this law. Secondly, if it were possible to do so, such compulsion would in itself be a direct negation of the very principle set up. Oblige all men to refrain from violence! Who then should enforce the decision? Thirdly, and this is the chief point, the question as put by Christ is not at all, Can Non-resistance become a general law for humanity? but, How must each man act to fulfil his allotted task, to save his soul, and to do the will of God?——which are all really one and the same thing.

Christian teaching does not lay down laws for everybody, and does not say to people, "You, all, for fear of punishment, must obey such and such rules, and then you will all be happy"; but it explains to each individual his position in relation to the world, and lets him see what results, for him individually, inevitably flow from that relation. Christianity says to man (and to each man separately) that his personal life can have no rational meaning if he counts it as belonging to himself, or as having for its aim worldly happiness for himself or for other people. This is so because the