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take me. I will, therefore, endeavor to explain myself more clearly! If, for instance, I should be too quick in issuing a writ, I provide him in doing so with a species of moral support or mainstay--I see you are laughing?" (Raskolnikoff, on the contrary, had no such desire; his lips were set, and his glaring look was not removed from Porphyrius's eyes.) "I assure you that in actual practice such is really the case; men vary much, although, unfortunately, our methods are the same for all. But you will ask me: Supposing you are certain of your proofs? Goodness me, _batuchka_! you know, perhaps as well as I do, what proofs are--half one's time, proofs may be taken either way; and I, a magistrate, am, after all, only a man liable to error. "Now, what I want is to give to my investigation the precision of a mathematical demonstration--I want my conclusions to be as plain, as indisputable, as that twice two are four. Now, supposing I have this gentleman arrested prematurely, though I may be positively certain that he is _the man,_ yet I deprive myself of all future means of proving his guilt. How is that? Because, so to say, I give him, to a certain extent, a definite status; for, by putting him in prison, I pacify him. I give him the chance of investigating his actual state of mind--he will escape me, for he will reflect. In a word, he knows that he is a prisoner, and nothing more. If, on the contrary, I take no kind of notice of the man I fancy guilty, if I do not have him arrested, if I in no way set him on his guard--but if the unfortunate creature is hourly, momentarily, possessed by the suspicion that I know all, that I do not lose sight of him either by night or by day, that he is the object of my indefatigable vigilance--what do you ask will take place under these circumstances? He will lose his self-possession, he will come of his own accord to me, he will provide me with ample evidence against himself, and will enable me to give to the conclusion of my inquiry the accuracy of mathematical proofs, which is not without its charm. "If such a course succeeds with an uncultured moujik, it is equally efficacious when it concerns an enlightened, intelligent, or even distinguished man. For the main thing, my dear friend, is to determine in what sense a man is developed. The man, I mean, is intelligent, but he has nerves which are _over_-strung. And as for bile--the bile you are forgetting, that plays no small part wit
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