staggering,
nothing takes a man's breath away like the beginning of any science.
From the first five or six lectures you are soaring on wings of the
brightest hopes, you already seem to yourself to be welcoming truth
with open arms. And I gave myself up to science, heart and soul,
passionately, as to the woman one loves. I was its slave; I found
it the sun of my existence, and asked for no other. I studied day
and night without rest, ruined myself over books, wept when before
my eyes men exploited science for their own personal ends. But my
enthusiasm did not last long. The trouble is that every science has
a beginning but not an end, like a recurring decimal. Zoology has
discovered 35,000 kinds of insects, chemistry reckons 60 elements.
If in time tens of noughts can be written after these figures.
Zoology and chemistry will be just as far from their end as now,
and all contemporary scientific work consists in increasing these
numbers. I saw through this trick when I discovered the 35,001-st
and felt no satisfaction. Well, I had no time to suffer from
disillusionment, as I was soon possessed by a new faith. I plunged
into Nihilism, with its manifestoes, its 'black divisions,' and all
the rest of it. I 'went to the people,' worked in factories, worked
as an oiler, as a barge hauler. Afterwards, when wandering over
Russia, I had a taste of Russian life, I turned into a fervent
devotee of that life. I loved the Russian people with poignant
intensity; I loved their God and believed in Him, and in their
language, their creative genius. . . . And so on, and so on. . . .
I have been a Slavophile in my time, I used to pester Aksakov with
letters, and I was a Ukrainophile, and an archaeologist, and a
collector of specimens of peasant art. . . . I was enthusiastic
over ideas, people, events, places . . . my enthusiasm was endless!
Five years ago I was working for the abolition of private property;
my last creed was non-resistance to evil."

Sasha gave an abrupt sigh and began moving. Liharev got up and went
to her.

"Won't you have some tea, dearie?" he asked tenderly.

"Drink it yourself," the child answered rudely. Liharev was
disconcerted, and went back to the table with a guilty step.

"Then you have had a lively time," said Mlle. Ilovaisky; "you have
something to remember."

"Well, yes, it's all very lively when one sits over tea and chatters
to a kind listener, but you should ask what that liveliness has
cost me!