Boyhood-6

“But what do you call egotism?” asked Nechludoff—smiling, as I

thought, a little contemptuously.

“Egotism is a conviction that we are better and cleverer than any one

else,” I replied.

“But how can we ALL be filled with this conviction?” he inquired.

“Well, I don’t know if I am right or not—certainly no one but myself

seems to hold the opinion—but I believe that I am wiser than any one

else in the world, and that all of you know it.”

“At least I can say for myself,” observed Nechludoff, “that I have met a

FEW people whom I believe to excel me in wisdom.”

“It is impossible,” I replied with conviction.

“Do you really think so?” he said, looking at me gravely.

“Yes, really,” I answered, and an idea crossed my mind which I proceeded

to expound further. “Let me prove it to you. Why do we love ourselves

better than any one else? Because we think ourselves BETTER than any one

else—more worthy of our own love. If we THOUGHT others better than

ourselves, we should LOVE them better than ourselves: but that is never

the case. And even if it were so, I should still be right,” I added with

an involuntary smile of complacency.

For a few minutes Nechludoff was silent.

“I never thought you were so clever,” he said with a smile so goodhumoured

and charming that I at once felt happy.

Praise exercises an all-potent influence, not only upon the feelings, but

also upon the intellect; so that under the influence of that agreeable

sensation I straightway felt much cleverer than before, and thoughts began

to rush with extraordinary rapidity through my head. From egotism we

passed insensibly to the theme of love, which seemed inexhaustible.

Although our reasonings might have sounded nonsensical to a listener (so

vague and one-sided were they), for ourselves they had a profound

significance. Our minds were so perfectly in harmony that not a chord was

struck in the one without awakening an echo in the other, and in this

harmonious striking of different chords we found the greatest delight.

Indeed, we felt as though time and language were insufficient to express

the thoughts which seethed within us.

XXVII. THE BEGINNING OF OUR FRIENDSHIP

From that time forth, a strange, but exceedingly pleasant, relation

subsisted between Dimitri Nechludoff and myself. Before other people he

paid me scanty attention, but as soon as ever we were alone, we would sit

down together in some comfortable corner and, forgetful both of time and

of everything around us, fall to reasoning.

We talked of a future life, of art, service, marriage, and education; nor

did the idea ever occur to us that very possibly all we said was shocking

nonsense. The reason why it never occurred to us was that the nonsense

which we talked was good, sensible nonsense, and that, so long as one is

young, one can appreciate good nonsense, and believe in it. In youth the

powers of the mind are directed wholly to the future, and that future

assumes such various, vivid, and alluring forms under the influence of

hope—hope based, not upon the experience of the past, but upon an

assumed possibility of happiness to come—that such dreams of

expected felicity constitute in themselves the true happiness of that

period of our life. How I loved those moments in our metaphysical

discussions (discussions which formed the major portion of our

intercourse) when thoughts came thronging faster and faster, and,

succeeding one another at lightning speed, and growing more and more

abstract, at length attained such a pitch of elevation that one felt

powerless to express them, and said something quite different from what

one had intended at first to say! How I liked those moments, too, when,

carried higher and higher into the realms of thought, we suddenly felt

that we could grasp its substance no longer and go no further!

At carnival time Nechludoff was so much taken up with one festivity and

another that, though he came to see us several times a day, he never

addressed a single word to me. This offended me so much that once again I

found myself thinking him a haughty, disagreeable fellow, and only awaited

an opportunity to show him that I no longer valued his company or felt any

particular affection for him. Accordingly, the first time that he spoke to

me after the carnival, I said that I had lessons to do, and went upstairs,

but a quarter of an hour later some one opened the schoolroom door, and

Nechludoff entered.

“Am I disturbing you?” he asked.

“No,” I replied, although I had at first intended to say that I had a

great deal to do.

“Then why did you run away just now? It is a long while since we had a

talk together, and I have grown so accustomed to these discussions that I

feel as though something were wanting.”

My anger had quite gone now, and Dimitri stood before me the same good and

lovable being as before.

“You know, perhaps, why I ran away?” I said.

“Perhaps I do,” he answered, taking a seat near me. “However, though it is

possible I know why, I cannot say it straight out, whereas YOU can.”

“Then I will do so. I ran away because I was angry with you—well,

not angry, but grieved. I always have an idea that you despise me for

being so young.”

“Well, do you know why I always feel so attracted towards you?” he

replied, meeting my confession with a look of kind understanding, “and why

I like you better than any of my other acquaintances or than any of the

people among whom I mostly have to live? It is because I found out at once

that you have the rare and astonishing gift of sincerity.”

“Yes, I always confess the things of which I am most ashamed—but

only to people in whom I trust,” I said.

“Ah, but to trust a man you must be his friend completely, and we are not

friends yet, Nicolas. Remember how, when we were speaking of friendship,

we agreed that, to be real friends, we ought to trust one another

implicitly.”

“I trust you in so far as that I feel convinced that you would never

repeat a word of what I might tell you,” I said.

“Yet perhaps the most interesting and important thoughts of all are just

those which we never tell one another, while the mean thoughts (the

thoughts which, if we only knew that we had to confess them to one

another, would probably never have the hardihood to enter our minds)—Well,

do you know what I am thinking of, Nicolas?” he broke off, rising and

taking my hand with a smile. “I propose (and I feel sure that it would

benefit us mutually) that we should pledge our word to one another to tell

each other EVERYTHING. We should then really know each other, and never

have anything on our consciences. And, to guard against outsiders, let us

also agree never to speak of one another to a third person. Suppose we do

that?”

“I agree,” I replied. And we did it. What the result was shall be told

hereafter.

Kerr has said that every attachment has two sides: one loves, and the

other allows himself to be loved; one kisses, and the other surrenders his

cheek. That is perfectly true. In the case of our own attachment it was I

who kissed, and Dimitri who surrendered his cheek—though he, in his

turn, was ready to pay me a similar salute. We loved equally because we

knew and appreciated each other thoroughly, but this did not prevent him

from exercising an influence over me, nor myself from rendering him

adoration.

It will readily be understood that Nechludoff’s influence caused me to

adopt his bent of mind, the essence of which lay in an enthusiastic

reverence for ideal virtue and a firm belief in man’s vocation to

perpetual perfection. To raise mankind, to abolish vice and misery, seemed

at that time a task offering no difficulties. To educate oneself to every

virtue, and so to achieve happiness, seemed a simple and easy matter.

Only God Himself knows whether those blessed dreams of youth were

ridiculous, or whose the fault was that they never became realised.