The laughter was increasing more and more, but it was mostly the young and, so to speak, less initiated guests who laughed. The faces of the hostess, Liputin, and the lame teacher expressed a certain vexation.
"If you yourself weren't able to hold your system together, and arrived at despair, what are we supposed to do?" one officer observed cautiously.
"You're right, mister active officer," Shigalyov turned abruptly to him, "and most of all in having used the word 'despair.' Yes, I kept arriving at despair; nevertheless, everything expounded in my book is irreplaceable, and there is no other way out; no one can invent anything. And so I hasten, without wasting time, to invite the whole society, having heard my book in the course of ten evenings, to state its opinion. And if the members do not want to listen to me, let us break up at the very beginning—the men to occupy themselves with state service, the women to go to their kitchens, for, having rejected my book, they will find no other way out. None what-so-ever! And by losing time, they will only harm themselves, because later they will inevitably come back to the same thing."
People began to stir. "Is he crazy, or what?" voices asked.
"So it all comes down to Shigalyov's despair," Lyamshin concluded, "and the essential question is whether he is to be or not to be in despair?"
"Shigalyov's proximity to despair is a personal question," the high-school boy declared.
"I suggest we vote on how far Shigalyov's despair concerns the common cause, and along with that, whether it's worth listening to him or not," the officer gaily decided.
"That's not the point here," the lame man finally mixed in. Generally, he spoke with a certain mocking smile, as it were, so that it might have been difficult to tell whether he was speaking sincerely or joking. "That's not the point here, gentlemen. Mr. Shigalyov is all too seriously devoted to his task, and, what's more, is too modest. I know his book. He suggests, as a final solution of the question, the division of mankind into two unequal parts. One tenth is granted freedom of person and unlimited rights over the remaining nine tenths. [150]These must lose their person and turn into something like a herd, and in unlimited obedience, through a series of regenerations, attain to primeval innocence, something like the primeval paradise—though, by the way, they will have to work. The measures proposed by the author for removing the will from nine tenths of mankind and remaking them into a herd, by means of a re-educating of entire generations—are quite remarkable, based on natural facts, and extremely logical. One may disagree with certain conclusions, but it is difficult to doubt the author's intelligence and knowledge. It's a pity the stipulation of ten evenings is totally incompatible with the circumstances, otherwise we might hear a great many interesting things."
"Are you really serious?" Madame Virginsky turned to the lame man even somewhat alarmed. "If this man, not knowing what to do about the people, turns nine tenths of them into slavery? I've long suspected him."
"Your own dear brother, you mean?" the lame man asked.
"Family ties? Are you laughing at me or not?"
"And, besides, to work for the aristocrats and obey them as if they were gods is vileness!" the girl student observed furiously.
"What I propose is not vileness but paradise, earthly paradise, and there can be no other on earth," Shigalyov concluded imperiously.
"Instead of paradise," Lyamshin shouted, "I'd take these nine tenths of mankind, since there's really nothing to do about them, and blow them sky-high, and leave just a bunch of learned people who would then start living happily in an educated way." [151]
"Only a buffoon could talk like that," the girl student flared up.
"He is a buffoon, but he's useful," Madame Virginsky whispered to her.
"And that might be the best solution of the problem," Shigalyov turned hotly to Lyamshin. "You, of course, don't even know what a profound thing you've managed to say, mister funny fellow. But since your idea is almost unrealizable, we must limit ourselves to the earthly paradise, if that's what we're calling it."
"That's a lot of nonsense, however!" escaped, as it were, from Verkhovensky. Nevertheless he went on cutting his nails with complete indifference and without raising his eyes.
"Why nonsense, sir?" the lame man picked up at once, as if he had just been waiting for his first word in order to seize upon it. "Why nonsense precisely? Mr. Shigalyov is somewhat of a fanatic in his love of mankind; but remember that in Fourier, in Cabet, and even in Proudhon himself, [152]there are many quite despotic and fantastic pre-resolutions of the problem. Mr. Shigalyov perhaps resolves the matter even far more soberly than they do. I assure you that after reading his book, it is almost impossible to disagree with some things. He is perhaps least distant of all from realism, and his earthly paradise is almost the real one, the very one mankind sighs for the loss of, if indeed it ever existed."
"Well, I just knew I was letting myself in for it," Verkhovensky muttered again.
"Excuse me, sir," the lame man was seething more and more, "conversations and judgments about the future social organization are an almost imperative necessity of all modern thinking people. Herzen spent his whole life worrying about just that. Belinsky, as I know for certain, passed whole evenings with his friends debating and pre-resolving beforehand even the pettiest kitchen details, so to speak, in the future social arrangement."
"Some even lose their minds," the major suddenly remarked.
"Still, it's possible to agree on something at least, rather than sit looking like dictators and say nothing," Liputin hissed, as if finally daring to begin an attack.
"When I said it was nonsense, I didn't mean Shigalyov," mumbled Verkhovensky. "You see, gentlemen," he raised his eyes a bit, "I think all these books, these Fouriers, Cabets, all these 'rights to work,' Shigalyovism [153]—it's all like novels, of which a hundred thousand can be written. An aesthetic pastime. I understand that you're bored in this wretched little town, so you fall on any paper with writing on it."
"Excuse me, sir," the lame man was twitching on his chair, "though we are provincials, and are most certainly deserving of pity for that, nevertheless we know that so far nothing so new has happened in the world that we should weep over having missed it. Now it is being suggested to us, through various strewn-about leaflets of foreign manufacture, that we close ranks and start groups with the sole purpose of universal destruction, under the pretext that however you try to cure the world, you're not going to cure it, but by radically lopping off a hundred million heads, thereby relieving ourselves, we can more assuredly jump over the little ditch. A beautiful thought, no doubt, but one at least as incompatible with reality as 'Shigalyovism,' to which you adverted just now with such disdain."
"Well, I really didn't come here for discussions," Verkhovensky let slip this significant little phrase and, as if not noticing the slip at all, moved the candle towards him to have more light.
"It's a pity, sir, a great pity, that you didn't come here for discussions, and a great pity that you're so occupied now with your toilette."
"And what is my toilette to you?"
"A hundred million heads are as hard to realize as remaking the world by propaganda. Maybe even harder, especially if it's in Russia," Liputin ventured again.