they live, they live a real life, not a fantastic one, for suffering is life. Without suffering what would be the pleasure of it? It would be transformed into an endless church service; it would be holy, but tedious. But what about me? I suffer, but still, I don’t live. I am x in an indeterminate equation. I am a sort of phantom in life who has lost all beginning and end, and who has even forgotten his own name. You are laughing—no, you are not laughing, you are angry again. You are forever angry, all you care about is intelligence, but I repeat again that I would give away all this super-stellar life, all the ranks and honors, simply to be transformed into the soul of a merchant’s wife weighing eighteen stone and set candles at
“Then even you don’t believe in God?” said Ivan, with a smile of hatred.
“What can I say?—that is, if you are in earnest—”
“Is there a God or not?” Ivan cried with the same savage intensity.
“Ah, then you are in earnest! My dear fellow, upon my word I don’t know. There! I’ve said it now!”
“You don’t know, but you see God? No, you are not someone apart, you are myself, you are I and nothing more! You are rubbish, you are my fancy!”
“Well, if you like, I have the same philosophy as you, that would be true. Je pense, donc je suis , I know that for a fact; all the rest, all these worlds, God and even Satan—all that is not proved, to my mind. Does all that exist of itself, or is it only an emanation of myself, a logical development of my ego which alone has existed forever: but I make haste to stop, for I believe you