THE FIRST STEP
(originally written, in Russian, as the Preface to the Russian translation of The Ethics of Diet by Howard Williams, first published 1883, Russian version from 1892.)
I.
If a man is not making a pretence of work, but is working
in order to accomplish the matter he has in hand,
his actions will necessarily follow one another in a
certain sequence determined by the nature of the work.
If he postpones to a later time what from the nature of
the work should be done first, or if he altogether omits
some essential part, he is certainly not working seriously,
but only pretending. 'This rule holds unalterably true
whether the work be physical or not. As one cannot
seriously wish to bake bread unless one first kneads
the flour and then heats the brick-oven, sweeps out
the ashes, and so on, so also one cannot seriously
wish to lead a good life without adopting a certain
order of succession in the attainment of the necessary
qualities.
With reference to right living this rule is especially
important ; for whereas in the case of physical work,
such as making bread, it is easy to discover by the
result whether a man is seriously engaged in work or is
only pretending, with reference to goodness of life no
such verification is possible. If people, without kneading
the dough or heating the oven, only pretend to
make bread—as they do in the theatre—then from the
result (the absence of bread) it becomes evident that
they were only pretending ; but when a man pretends
to be leading a good life we have no such direct indications
that he is not striving seriously but only pretending, for not only are the results of a good life not always evident and palpable to those around, but very often
such results even appear to them harmful. Respect for
a man's activity, and the acknowledgment of its utility
and pleasantness by his contemporaries, furnish no
proof of the real goodness of his life.
Therefore, to distinguish the reality from the mere
appearance of a good life, the indication given by a
regular order of succession in the acquirement of the
essential qualities is especially valuable. And this
indication is valuable, not so much to enable us to discover
the seriousness of other men's strivings after
goodness as to test this sincerity in ourselves, for in
this respect we are liable to deceive ourselves even more
than we deceive others.
A correct order of succession in the attainment of
virtues is an indispensable condition of advance towards
a good life, and consequently the teachers of mankind
have always prescribed a certain invariable order for
their attainment.
All moral teachings set up that ladder which, as the
Chinese wisdom has it, reaches from earth to heaven,
and the ascent of which can only be accomplished by
starting from the lowest step. As in the teaching of
the Brahmins, Buddhists, Confucians, so also in the
teaching of the Greek sages, steps were fixed, and a
superior step could not be attained without the lower
one having been previously taken. All the moral
teachers of mankind, religious and non-religious alike,
have admitted the necessity of a definite order of succession
in the attainment of the qualities essential to
a righteous life. The necessity for this sequence lies
in the very essence of things, and therefore, it would
seem, ought to be recognised by everyone.
But, strange to say, from the time Church-Christianity
spread widely, the consciousness of this necessary
order appears to have been more and more lost,
and is now retained only among ascetics and monks.
Among worldly Christians it is taken for granted that
the higher virtues may be attained not only in the absence of the lower ones, which are a necessary condition
of the higher, but even in company with the
greatest vices ; and consequently the very conception
of what it is that constitutes a good life, has reached, in
the minds of the majority of worldly people to-day, a
state of the greatest confusion.
II.
In our times people have quite lost the consciousness
of the necessity of a sequence in the qualities a man
must have to enable him to live a good life, and, as a
consequence, they have lost the very conception of what
constitutes a good life. This, it seems to me, has come
about in the following way.
When Christianity replaced heathenism it put forth
moral demands superior to the heathen ones, and at the
same time (as was also the case with heathen morality)
it necessarily laid down one indispensable order for the
attainment of virtues—certain steps to the attainment
of a righteous life.
Plato's virtues, beginning with self-control, advanced
through courage and wisdom to justice ; the Christian
virtues, commencing with self-renunciation, rise
through devotion to the will of God, to love.
Those who accepted Christianity seriously and strove
to live righteous Christian lives, thus understood
Christianity, and always began living rightly by renouncing
their lusts ; which renunciation included the
self-control of the pagans.
But let it not be supposed that Christianity in this
matter was only echoing the teachings of paganism ;
let me not be accused of degrading Christianity from
its lofty place to the level of heathenism. Such an
accusation would be unjust, for I regard the Christian
teaching as the highest the world has known, and as
quite different from heathenism. Christian teaching
replaced pagan teaching simply because the former was
different from, and superior to, the latter. But both
Christian and pagan teaching alike, lead men toward truth and goodness ; and as these are always the same,
the way to them must also be the same, and the first
steps on this way must inevitably be the same for
Christian as for heathen.
The difference between the Christian and pagan
teaching of goodness lies in this : that the heathen
teaching is one of final perfection, while the Christian
is one of infinite perfecting. Every heathen, non-Christian, teaching sets before men a model of final
perfection ; but the Christian teaching sets before them
a model of infinite perfection. Plato, for instance,
makes justice the model of perfection, whereas Christ's
model is the infinite perfection of love. 'Be ye perfect,
even as your Father in heaven is perfect.' In this lies
the difference, and from this results the different relation
of pagan and Christian teaching toward different
grades of virtue. According to the former, the attainment
of the highest virtue was possible, and each step
toward this attainment had its comparative merit—the
higher the step the greater the merit ; so that from the
pagan point of view men may be divided into moral and
immoral, into more or less immoral—whereas, according
to the Christian teaching, which sets up the ideal
of infinite perfection, this division is impossible. There
can be neither higher nor lower grades. In the
Christian teaching, which shows the infinity of perfection,
all steps are equal in relation to the infinite
ideal.
Among the heathens the plane of virtue attained by a
man constituted his merit ; in Christianity merit consists
only in the process of attaining, in the greater or
lesser speed of attainment. From the heathen point of
view, a man who possessed the virtue of reasonableness
stood morally higher than one deficient in that virtue ;
a man who, in addition to reasonableness, possessed
courage stood higher still ; a man who to reasonableness
and courage added justice stood yet higher. But one
Christian cannot be regarded as morally either higher
or lower than another. A man is more or less of a
Christian only in proportion to the speed with which he advances towards infinite perfection,, irrespective of the
stage he may have reached at a given moment. Hence
the stationary righteousness of the Pharisee was worth
less than the progress of the repentant thief on the
cross.
Such is the difference between the Christian and the
heathen teachings. Consequently the stages of virtue,
as, for instance, self-control and courage, which in
paganism constitute merit, constitute none whatever in
Christianity. In this respect the teachings differ. But
with regard to the fact that there can be no advance
toward virtue, toward perfection, except by mounting
the lowest steps, paganism and Christianity are alike :
here there can be no difference.
The Christian, like the heathen, must commence the
work of perfecting himself from the beginning —
i.e., at
the step at which the heathen begins it, namely, self control;
just as a man who wishes to ascend a flight of
stairs cannot avoid beginning at the first step. The
only difference is that for the pagan, self-control itself
constitutes a virtue ; whereas for the Christian, it is
only part of that self-abnegation which is itself but an
indispensable condition of all aspiration after perfection.
Therefore the manifestation of true Christianity could
not but follow the same path that had been indicated
and followed by paganism.
But not all men have understood Christianity as
an aspiration towards the perfection of the heavenly
Father, the majority of people have regarded it as a
teaching about salvation —
i.e., deliverance from sin by
grace transmitted through the Church, according to
Catholics and Greek Orthodox ; by faith in the Redemption,
according to Protestants, the Reformed
Church, and Calvinists ; or, according to some, by means
of the two combined.
And it is precisely this teaching that has destroyed
the sincerity and seriousness of men's relation to the
moral teaching of Christianity. However much the
representatives of these faiths may preach that these
means of salvation do not hinder man in his aspiration
after a righteous life, but on the contrary contribute
toward it—still, from certain assertions certain deductions
necessarily follow, and no arguments can prevent
men from making these deductions, when once they
have accepted the assertions from which they flow. If
a man believe that he can be saved through grace transmitted
by the Church, or through the sacrifice of the
Redemption, it is natural for him to think that efforts
of his own to live a right life are unnecessary—the
more so when he is told that even the hope that his
efforts will make him better is a sin. Consequently a
man who believes that there are means other than personal
effort by which he may escape sin or its results,
cannot strive with the same energy and seriousness as
the man who knows no other means. And not striving
with perfect seriousness, and knowing of other means
besides personal effort, a man will inevitably neglect
the unalterable order of succession for the attainment
of the good qualities necessary to a good life. And
this has happened with the majority of those who
profess Christianity.
III.
The doctrine that personal effort is not necessary
for the attainment of spiritual perfection by man, but
that there are other means for its acquirement, caused a
relaxation of efforts to live a good life and a neglect of
the consecutiveness indispensable for such a life.
The great mass of those who accepted Christianity,
accepting it only externally, took advantage of the substitution
of Christianity for paganism to rid themselves
of the demands of the heathen virtues—no longer necessary
for a Christian—and to free themselves from all
conflict with their animal nature.
The same thing happens with those who cease to
believe in the teaching of the Church, they are like
the before-mentioned believers, only they put forward —instead of grace, bestowed by the Church or through
Redemption—some imaginary good work, approved of by the majority of men, such as the service of science,
art, or humanity ; and in the name of this imaginary
good work they liberate themselves from the consecutive
attainment of the qualities necessary for a good
life, and are satisfied, like men on the stage, with pretending
to live a good life.
Those who fell away from paganism without embracing
Christianity in its true significance, began to preach
love for God and man apart from self-renunciation,
and justice without self-control ; that is to say, they
preached the higher virtues omitting the lower ones :
i.e., not the virtues themselves, but the semblance.
Some preach love to God and man without self renunciation,
and others humaneness, the service of
humanity, without self-control. And as this teaching,
while pretending to introduce man into higher moral
regions, encourages his animal nature by liberating
him from the most elementary demands of morality—long ago acknowledged by the heathens, and not
only not rejected but strengthened by true Christianity—
it was readily accepted both by believers and
unbelievers.
Only the other day the Pope's Encyclical (1) on
Socialism was published, in which, after a pretended
refutation of the Socialist view of the wrongfulness of
private property, it was plainly said :
'No one in commanded
to distribute to others that which is required for
his own necessities and those of his household ; nor even to
give away what is reasonably required to keep up becomingly
his condition in life ; for no one ought to live
unbecomingly.' (This is from St. Thomas Aquinas, who
says, Nullus enim inconvenienter vivere debet.) ' But
when necessity has been fairly supplied, and one's position
fairly considered, it is a duty to give to the indigent out of
that which is over. That which remaineth give alms.'
Thus now preaches the head of the most wide-spread
Church. Thus have preached all the Church teachers, who considered salvation by works as insufficient. And
together with this teaching of selfishness, which prescribes
that you shall give to your neighbours only
what you do not want yourself, they preach love, and
recall with pathos the celebrated words of Paul in the
thirteenth chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians,
about love.
Notwithstanding that the Gospels overflow with
demands for self-renunciation, with indications that
self-renunciation is the first condition of Christian perfection
; notwithstanding such dear expressions as :
'Whosoever will not take up his cross ..." 'Whosoever
hath not forsaken father and mother . . .'Whosoever
shall lose his life . .
.'—people assure themselves
and others that it is possible to love men without
renouncing that to which one is accustomed, or even
what one ceases to consider becoming for one's self.
So speak the Church people ; and those who reject
not only the Church but also the Christian teaching (Freethinkers) think, speak, write, and act, in just the
same way. These men assure themselves and others
that without in the least diminishing their needs, without
overcoming their lusts, they can serve mankind —i.e., lead a good life.
Men have thrown aside the heathen sequence of
virtues; but, not assimilating the Christian teaching in
its true significance, they have not accepted the Christian
sequence, and are left quite without guidance.
IV.
In olden times, when there was no Christian teaching,
all the teachers of life, beginning with Socrates,
regarded as the first virtue of life, self-control —
[greek] or [greek] ; and it was understood that every virtue
must begin with and pass through this one. It was
clear that a man who had no self-control, who had
developed an immense number of desires and had
yielded himself up to them, could not lead a good life.
It was evident that before a man could even think of disinterestedness, justice —to say nothing of generosity
or love—he must learn to exercise control over himself.
According to our ideas now, nothing of the sort is
necessary. We are convinced that a man who has
developed his desires to the climax reached in our
society, a man who cannot live without satisfying the
hundred unnecessary habits that enslave him, can yet
lead an altogether moral and good life. Looked at
from any point of view : the lowest, utilitarian ; the
higher, pagan, which demands justice ; but especially
from the highest. Christian, which demands love—it
should surely he clear to every one that a man who
uses for his own pleasure (which he might easily
forego) the labour, often the painful labour, of others,
behaves wrongly ; and that this is the very first wrong
he must cease to commit if he wishes to live a good life.
From the utilitarian point of view such conduct is
bad, because as long as he forces others to work for
him a man is always in an unstable position ; he
accustoms himself to the satisfaction of his desires and
becomes enslaved by them, while those who work for
him do so with hatred and envy, and only await an
opportunity to free themselves from the necessity of
so working. Consequently such a man is always in
danger of being left with deeply rooted habits which
create demands he cannot satisfy.
From the point of view of justice such conduct is
bad, because it is not well to employ for one's own
pleasure the labour of other men who themselves
cannot afford a hundredth part of the pleasures enjoyed
by him for whom they labour.
From the point of view of Christian love it can
hardly be necessary to prove that a man who loves
others will give them his own labour rather than take
from them, for his own pleasure, the fruit of their labour.
But these demands of utility, justice, and love, are
altogether ignored by our modern society. With us
the effort to limit one's desires is regarded as neither
the first, nor even the last, but as an altogether unnecessary,
condition of a good life.
On the contrary, according to the prevailing: and
most widely spread teaching of life to-day, the augmentation of one's wants is regarded as a desirable condition
; as a sign of development, civilization, culture, and
perfection. So-called educated people regard habits
of comfort, that is, of effeminacy, as not only harmless, but even good, indicating a certain moral elevation—as
almost a virtue.
It is thought that the more the wants, and the more
refined these wants, the better.
Nothing shows this more clearly than the descriptive
poetry, and especially the novels, of the last two centuries.
How are the heroes and heroines who represent the
ideals of virtue portrayed ?
In most cases the men who are meant to represent
something noble and lofty—from Childe Harold down
to the latest heroes of Feuillet, Trollope, or Maupassant —are simply depraved sluggards, consuming in luxury
the labour of thousands, and themselves doing nothing
useful for anybody; The heroines are the mistresses
who in one way or another afford more or less delight
to these men, are as idle as they, and are equally ready
to consume the labour of others by their luxury.
I do not refer to the representations of really
abstemious and industrious people one occasionally
meets with in literature. I am speaking of the usual
type that serves as an ideal to the masses : of the
character that the majority of men and women are
trying to resemble. I remember the difficulty (inexplicable
to me at the time) that I experienced when
I wrote novels, a difficulty with which I contended and
with which 1 know all novelists now contend who have
even the dimmest conception of what constitutes real
moral beauty—the difficulty of portraying a type taken
from the upper classes as ideally good and kind, and at
the same time true to life. To be true to life, a
description of a man or woman of the upper, educated
classes must show him in his usual surroundings—that
is, in luxury, physical idleness, and demanding much.
From a moral point of view such a person is undoubtedly
objectionable. But it is necessary to
represent this person in such a way that he may appear
attractive. And novelists try so to represent him. I
also tried. And strange to say, such a representation,
making an immoral fornicator and murderer (duellist or
soldier), an utterly useless, idly drifting, fashionable
buffoon, appear attractive, does not require much art
or effort. The readers of novels are, for the most
part, exactly such men, and therefore readily believe
that these Childe Harolds, Onegins, Monsieurs de
Camors,(2) etc., are very excellent people.
V.
Clear proof that the men of our time really do not
admit pagan self-control and Christian self-renunciation
to be good and desirable qualities, but, on the
contrary, regard the augmentation of wants as good
and elevated, is to be found in the education given to
the vast majority of children in our society. Not only
are they not trained to self-control, as among the
pagans, or to the self-renunciation proper to Christians,
but they are deliberately inoculated with habits of
effeminacy, physical idleness, and luxury.
I have long wished to write a fairy-tale of this kind :
A woman, wishing to revenge herself on one who has
injured her, carries off her enemy's child, and, going to
a sorcerer, asks him to teach her how she can most
cruelly wreak her vengeance on the stolen infant, the
only child of her enemy. The sorcerer bids her carry
the child to a place he indicates, and assures her that a
most terrible vengeance will result. the wicked woman
follows his advice ; but, keeping an eye upon the child
is astonished to see that it is found and adopted by a
wealthy, childless man. She goes to the sorcerer and reproaches him, but he bids her wait. The child grows
up in luxury and effeminacy. The woman is perplexed,
but again the sorcerer bids her wait. And at length
the time comes when the wicked woman is not only
satisfied, but has even to pity her victim. He grows up
in the effeminacy and dissoluteness of wealth, and
owing to his good nature is ruined. Then begins a
sequence of physical sufferings, poverty, and humiliation,
to which he is especially sensitive and against
which he knows not how to contend. Aspirations
toward a moral life— and the weakness of his effeminate
body accustomed to luxury and idleness ; vain
struggles ; lower and still lower decline ; drunkenness
to drown thought, then crime and insanity or suicide.
And, indeed, one cannot regard without terror the
education of the children of the wealthy class in our
day. Only the cruellest foe could, one would think,
inoculate a child with those defects and vices which are
now instilled into him by his parents, especially by
mothers. One is awestruck at the sight, and still
more at the results of this, if only one knows how to
discern what is taking place in the souls of the best of
these children, so carefully ruined by their parents.
Habits of effeminacy are instilled into them at a time
when they do not yet understand their moral significance.
Not only is the habit of temperance and self-control
neglected, but, contrary to the educational
practice of Sparta and of the ancient world in general,
this quality is altogether atrophied. Not only is man
not trained to work, and to all the qualities essential to
fruitful labour—concentration of mind, strenuousness,
endurance, enthusiasm for work, ability to repair what
is spoiled, familiarity with fatigue, joy in attainment—
but he is habituated to idleness, and to contempt for all
the products of labour : is taught to spoil, throw away,
and again procure for money anything he fancies,
without a thought of how things are made. Man is
deprived of the power of acquiring the primary virtue
of reasonableness, indispensable for the attainment of
all the others, and is let loose in a world where people preach, and praise, the lofty virtues of justice, the
service of man, and love.
It is well if the youth be endowed with a morally
feeble and obtuse nature, which does not detect the
difference between make-believe and genuine goodness
of life, and is satisfied with the prevailing mutual
deception. If this be the case all goes apparently well,
and such a man will sometimes quietly live on with his
moral consciousness unawakened till death.
But it is not always thus, especially of late, now that
the consciousness of the immorality of such life fills the
air, and penetrates the heart unsought. Frequently,
and ever more frequently, it happens that there
awakens a demand for real, unfeigned morality ; and
then begin a painful inner struggle and suffering which
end but rarely in the triumph of the moral sentiment.
A man feels that his life is bad, that he must reform
it from the very roots, and he tries to do so ; but he is
then attacked on all sides by those who have passed
through a similar struggle and have been vanquished.
They endeavour by every means to convince him that
this reform is quite unnecessary : that goodness does
not at all depend upon self-control and self-renunciation,
that it is possible, while addicting himself to
gluttony, personal adornment, physical idleness, and
even fornication, to be a perfectly good and useful man.
And the struggle, inmost cases, terminates lamentably.
Either the man, overcome by his weakness, yields to
the general opinion, stifles the voice of conscience,
distorts his reason to justify himself, and continues to
lead the old dissipated life, assuring himself that it is
redeemed by faith in the Redemption or the Sacraments,
or by service to science, to the State, or to art
or else he struggles, suffers, and finally becomes insane
or shoots himself.
It seldom happens, amid all the temptations that
surround him, that a man of our society understands
what was thousands of years ago, and still is, an
elementary truth for all reasonable people : namely,
that for the attainment of a good life it is necessary, first of all, to cease to live an evil life ; that for the
attainment of the higher virtues it is needful, first
of all, to acquire the virtue of abstinence or self-control,
as the pagans called it, or of self-renunciation,
as Christianity has it, and therefore it seldom happens
that, by gradual efforts, he succeeds in attaining this
primary virtue.
VI.
I have just been reading the letters of one of our
highly educated and advanced men of the 'forties, the
exile Ogaryóf, to another yet more highly educated
and gifted man, Herzen. In these letters Ogaryóf
gives expression to his sincere thoughts and highest
aspirations, and one cannot fail to see that—as was
natural to a young man—he rather shows off before
his friend. He talks of self-perfecting, of sacred
friendship, love, the service of science, of humanity,
and the like. And at the same time he calmly writes
that he often irritates the companion of his life by, as
he expresses it, 'returning home in an unsober state,
or disappearing for many hours with a fallen, but dear
creature. . . .'
Evidently it never even occurred to this remarkably
kind-hearted, talented, and well-educated man that
there was anything at all objectionable in the fact that
he, a married man, awaiting the confinement of his wife
(in his next letter he writes that his wife has given
birth to a child), returned home intoxicated, and disappeared
with dissolute women. It did not enter his
head that until he had commenced the struggle, and
had, at least to some extent, conquered his inclination
to drunkenness and fornication, he could not think of
friendship and love, and still less of serving any one or
any thing. But he not only did not struggle against
these vices—he evidently thought there was something
very nice in them, and that they did not in the least
hinder the struggle for perfection ; and, therefore,
instead of hiding them from the friend in whose eyes he wishes to appear in a good light, he exhibits
them.
Thus it was half a century ago. I was contemporary
with such men, I knew Ogaryóf and Herzen themselves,
and others of that stamp, and men educated in
the same traditions. There was a remarkable absence
of consistency in the lives of all these men. Together
with a sincere and ardent wish for good, there was an
utter looseness of personal desire, which, they thought,
could not hinder the living of a good life, nor the performance
of good, and even great, deeds. They put
unkneaded loaves into a cold oven, and believed that
bread would be baked. And then, when with advancing
years they began to remark that the bread did not bake—i.e., that no good came of their lives—they saw in this
something peculiarly tragic.
And the tragedy of such lives is indeed terrible.
And this same tragedy apparent in the lives of Herzen,
Ogaryóf, and others of their time, exists to-day in the
lives of very many so-called educated people who hold
the same views. A man desires to lead a good life, but
the consecutiveness which is indispensable for this is
lost in the society in which he lives. As fifty years
ago Ogaryóf, Herzen, and others, so also the majority
of men of the present day are persuaded that to lead an
effeminate life, to eat sweet and fat dishes, to delight
one's self in every way and satisfy all one's desires,
does not hinder one from living a good life, but as it
is evident that a good life in their case does not result,
they give themselves up to pessimism, and say, 'Such
is the tragedy of human life.'
What is also strange in the case is that these people
know that the distribution of pleasures among men is
unequal, and regard this inequality as an evil, and wish
to correct it, yet do not cease to strive to augment their
own pleasures —
i.e., to augment inequality in the distribution
of pleasures. In acting thus, these people are
like men who being the first to enter an orchard hasten
to gather all the fruit they can lay their hands on, and
yet wish to organize a more equal distribution of the fruit of the orchard between themselves and later
comers, while they continue to pluck all the fruit they
can reach.
VII.
The delusion that men while addicting themselves to
their desires and regarding this life of desire as good,
can yet lead a good, useful, just and loving life, is so
astonishing, that men of later generations will, I should
think, simply fail to understand what the men of our
time meant by the words 'good life,' when they said
that the gluttons—the effeminate, lustful sluggards—of
our wealthy classes led good lives. Indeed, one need
only put aside for a moment the customary view of the
life of our wealthy classes, and look at it, I do not say
from the Christian point of view, but from the pagan
standpoint, from the standpoint of the very lowest
demands of justice, to be convinced that, living amidst
the violation of the plainest laws of justice or fairness,
such as even children in their games think it wrong to
violate, we, men of the wealthy classes, have no right
even to talk about a good life.
Any man of our society who would, I do not say
begin a good life, but even begin to make some little
approach towards it, must first of all cease to lead a bad
life, must begin to destroy those conditions of an evil
life with which he finds himself surrounded.
How often one hears, as an excuse for not reforming
our lives, the argument that any act that is contrary
to the usual mode of life would be unnatural, ludicrous—would look like a desire to show off, and would
therefore not be a good action. This argument
seems expressly framed to prevent people from ever
changing their evil lives. If all our life were good,
just, kind, then and only then would an action in
conformity with the usual mode of life be good. If
half our life were good and the other half bad, then
there would be as much chance of an action not in
conformity with the usual mode of life being good as of
its being bad. But when life is altogether bad and wrong, as is the case in our upper classes, then a man
cannot perform a single good action without disturbing
the usual current of life. He can do a bad action
without disturbing this current, but not a good one.
A man accustomed to the life of our well-to-do classes
cannot lead a righteous life without first coming out of
those conditions of evil in which he is immersed—he
cannot begin to do good until he has ceased to do evil.
It is impossible for a man living in luxury to lead a
righteous life. All his efforts after goodness will be in
vain until he changes his life, until he performs that
work which stands first in sequence before him. A
good life according to the pagan view, and still more
according to the Christian view, is, and can be,
measured in no other way than by the mathematical
relation between love for self and love for others. The
less there is of love for self with all the ensuing care
about self and the selfish demands made upon the
labour of others, and the more there is of love for
others, with the resultant care for and labour bestowed
upon others, the better is the life.
Thus has goodness of life been understood by all the
sages of the world and by all true Christians, and in
exactly the same way do all plain men understand it
now. The more a man gives to others and the less he
demands for himself, the better he is : the less he gives
to others and the more he demands for himself, the
worse he is.
And not only does a man become morally better the
more love he has for others and the less for himself,
but the less he loves himself the easier it becomes for
him to be better, and contrariwise. The more a man
loves himself, and, consequently, the more he demands
labour from others, the less possibility is there for him
to love and to work for others, and less not only in as
many times as his love for himself has increased, but
in some enormously greater degree less, as happens if
we move the fulcrum of a lever from the long end to
the short one : this will not only lengthen the long arm,
but will also shorten the short one. So, also, if a man, possessing a certain faculty, love, augment his love and
care for himself, he will thereby diminish his power of
loving and caring for others, not only in proportion to
the love he has transferred to himself, but in a much
greater degree. Instead of feeding others a man eats
too much himself; by so doing he not only diminishes
the possibility of giving away the surplus, but, by
overeating, he deprives himself of power to help
others.
In order to love others in reality and not in word
only, one must cease to love one's self also in reality
and not merely in word. In most cases it happens
thus : we think we love others, we assure ourselves and
others that it is so, but we love them only in words,
while ourselves we love in reality. Others we forget
to feed and put to bed, ourselves—never. Therefore,
in order really to love others in deed, we must learn
not to love ourselves in deed, learn to forget to feed
ourselves and put ourselves to bed, exactly as we forget
to do these things for others.
We say of a self-indulgent person accustomed to lead
a luxurious life, that he is a 'good man' and 'leads a
good life.' but such a person—whether man or woman—although he may possess the most amiable traits of
character, meekness, good nature, etc., cannot be good
and lead a good life, any more than a knife of the very
best workmanship and steel can be sharp and cut well
unless it is sharpened. To be good and lead a good
life means to give to others more than one takes from
them. But a self-indulgent man accustomed to a
luxurious life cannot do this, first because he himself is
always in want of much (and this not on account of his
selfishness, but because he is accustomed to luxury and
it is painful for him to be deprived of that to which he
is accustomed) ; and secondly, because by consuming
all that he receives from others he weakens himself and
renders himself unfit to labour, and therefore unfit to
serve others. A self-indulgent man who sleeps long
upon a soft bed, eats and drinks abundance of fat,
sweet food, who is always dressed cleanly and suitably to the temperature, who has never accustomed himself
to the effort of laborious work, can do very little.
We are so accustomed to our own lies and the lies of
others, and it is so convenient for us not to see through
the lies of others, that they may not see through ours,
that we are not in the least astonished at, and do not
doubt the truth of, the assertion of the virtuousness,
sometimes even the sanctity, of people who are leading
a perfectly unrestrained life.
A person, man or woman, sleeps on a spring bed
with two mattresses, and two smooth, clean sheets, and
feather pillows in pillow cases. By the bedside is a
rug, that the feet may not get cold on stepping out of
bed, though slippers also lie near. Here also are the
necessary utensils, so that he need not leave the house—whatever uncleanliness he may produce will be
carried away and all made tidy. The windows are
covered with curtains that the daylight may not
awaken him, and he sleeps as long as he is inclined.
Besides all this, measures are taken that the room may
be warm in winter and cool in summer, and that he
may not be disturbed by the noise of flies or other
insects, while he sleeps, water, hot and cold, for his
ablutions, sometimes baths and preparations for shaving,
are provided. Tea and coffee are also prepared,
stimulating drinks to be taken immediately upon rising.
Boots, shoes, galoshes—several pairs dirtied the previous
day—are already being cleaned and made to shine like
glass freed from every speck of dust. Similarly are
cleaned various garments, soiled on the preceding day,
differing in texture to suit not only summer and winter,
but also spring, autumn, rainy, damp, and warm
weather. Clean linen, washed, starched, and ironed,
is being made ready with studs, shirt buttons, buttonholes,
all carefully inspected by specially appointed
people.
If the person be active he rises early— at seven
o'clock—
i.e., still a couple of hours later than those
who are making all these preparations for him. Besides
clothes for the day and covering for the night, there is also .1 costume and foot-gear for the time of dressing —dressing-gown and slippers ; and now he undertakes his
washing, cleaning, brushing, for which several
kinds of brushes are used, as well as soap and a great
quantity of water. (Many English men and women,
for some reason or other, are specially proud of using
a great deal of soap and pouring a large quantity of
water over themselves.) Then he dresses, brushes his
hair before a special kind of looking-glass (different
from those that hang in almost every room in the
house), takes the things he needs, such as spectacles or
eyeglasses, and then distributes in different pockets a
clean pocket-handkerchief to blow his nose on ; a
watch with a chain, though in almost every room he
goes to there will be a clock ; money of various kinds,
small change (often in a specially contrived case which
saves him the trouble of looking for the required coin)
and bank-notes ; also visiting cards on which his name
is printed (saving him the trouble of saying or writing
it) ; pocket-book and pencil. In the case of women,
the toilet is still more complicated : corsets, arranging
of long hair, adornments, laces, elastics, ribbons, ties,
hairpins, pins, brooches.
But at last all is complete and the day commences,
generally with eating: tea and coffee are drunk with a
great quantity of sugar ; bread made of the finest white
flour is eaten with large quantities of butter, and sometimes
the flesh of pigs. The men for the most part
smoke cigars or cigarettes meanwhile, and read fresh
papers, which have just been brought. Then, leaving
to others the task of setting right the soiled and disordered
room, they go to their office or business, or
drive in carriages produced specially to move such
people about. Then comes a luncheon of slain beasts,
birds, and fish, followed by a dinner consisting, if it be
very modest, of three courses, dessert, and coffee.
Then playing at cards and playing music— or the
theatre, reading, and conversation, in soft spring armchairs,
by the intensified and shaded light of candles,
gas, or electricity. After this, again tea, again eating—supper—and again to bed, shaken up and prepared
with clean linen, and with washed utensils to be again
made foul.
Thus pass the days of a man of modest life, of whom,
if he is good-natured and does not possess any habits
specially obnoxious to those about him, it is said that
he leads a good and virtuous life.
But a good life is the life of a man who does good to
others ; and can a man accustomed to live thus do
good to others? Before he can do good to men he
must cease to do evil. Reckon up all the harm such a
man, often unconsciously, does to others, and you will
see that he is far indeed from doing good ; he would
have to perform many acts of heroism to redeem the
evil he commits, hut he is too much enfeebled by his
life full of desires to perform any such acts. He might
sleep with more advantage, both physical and moral,
lying on the floor wrapped in his cloak, as Marcus
Aurelius did ; and thus he might save all the labour
and trouble involved in the manufacture of mattresses,
springs, and pillows, as also the daily labour of the
laundress—one of the weaker sex burdened by the
bearing and nursing of children—who washes linen for
this strong man. By going to bed earlier and getting
up earlier he might save window-curtains and the
evening lamp. He might sleep in the same shirt he
wears during the day, might step barefooted upon the
floor, and go out into the yard ; he might wash at the
pump—in a word, he might live like those who work
for him, and might thus save all this work that is done
for him. He might save all the labour expended upon
his clothing, his refined food, his recreations. And he
knows under what conditions all these labours are
performed : how in performing them men perish, suffer,
and often hate those who take advantage of their
poverty to force them to do it.
How, then, is such a man to do good to others and
lead a righteous life, without abandoning this self-indulgent,
luxurious life?
But we need not speak of how other people appear in our eyes—every one must see and feel this concerning
himself.
I cannot but repeat this same thing again and again,
notwithstanding the cold and hostile silence with which
my words are received. A moral man, living a life of
comfort, a man even of the middle class (I will not
speak of the upper classes, who daily consume to satisfy
their caprices the results of hundreds of working days),
cannot live quietly, knowing that all that he is using is
produced by the labour and crushed lives of working
people, who are dying without hope—ignorant, drunken,
dissolute, half-savage creatures employed in mines,
factories, and at agricultural labour, producing the
articles that he uses.
At the present moment I who am writing this and
you who will read it, whoever you may he—both you
and I have wholesome, sufficient, perhaps abundant
and luxurious food, pure, warm air to breathe, winter
and summer clothing, various recreations, and, most
important of all, we have leisure by day and undisturbed
repose at night. And here, by our side, live the
working people, who have neither wholesome food, nor
healthy lodgings, nor sufficient clothing, nor recreations,
and who, above all, are deprived not only of
leisure but even of rest : old men, children, women,
worn out by labour, by sleepless nights, by disease,
who spend their whole lives providing for us those
articles of comfort and luxury which they do not
possess, and which are for us not necessaries but superfluities. Therefore, a moral man, I do not say a
Christian, but simply a man professing humane views
or merely esteeming justice, cannot but wish to change
his life and to cease to use articles of luxury produced
under such conditions.
If a man really pities those who manufacture tobacco,
then the first thing he will naturally do will be to
cease smoking, because by continuing to buy and
smoke tobacco he encourages the preparation of
tobacco, by which men's health is destroyed. And so
with every other article of luxury. If a man can still continue to eat bread notwithstanding the hard work
by which it is produced, this is because he cannot
forego what is indispensable while waiting for the
present conditions of labour to be altered. But with
regard to things which are not only unnecessary but
are even superfluous, there can be no other conclusion
than this : that if I pity men engaged in the manufacture
of certain articles, then I must on no account
accustom myself to require such articles.
But nowadays men argue otherwise. They invent
the most various and intricate arguments, but never say
what naturally occurs to every plain man. According
to them, it is not at all necessary to abstain from
luxuries. One can sympathize with the condition of
the working men, deliver speeches and write books
on their behalf, and at the same time continue to
profit by the labour that one sees to be ruinous to
them.
According to one argument, I may profit by labour
that is harmful to the workers, because if I do not
another will, which is something like the argument
that I must drink wine that is injurious to me, because
it has been bought, and if I do not drink it others will
do so.
According to another argument, it is even beneficial
to the workers to be allowed to produce luxuries, as in
this way we provide them with money—i.e., with the
means of subsistence : as if we could not provide them
with the means of subsistence in any other way than
by making them produce articles injurious to them and
superfluous to us.
But according to a third argument, now most popular,
it seems that, since there is such a thing as division of
labour, any work upon which a man is engaged—
whether he be a Government official, priest, landowner,
manufacturer, or merchant—is so useful that it fully
compensates for the labour of the working classes by
which he profits. One serves the State, another the
Church, a third science, a fourth art, and a fifth serves
those who serve the State, science, and art ; and all are firmly convinced that what they give to mankind certainly
compensates for all they take. And it is astonishing
how, while continually augmenting their luxurious
requirements without increasing their activity, these
people continue to be certain that their activity compensates
for all they consume.
Whereas, if you listen to these people's judgment of
one another, it appears that each individual is far from
being worth what he consumes. Government officials
say that the work of the landlords is not worth what
they spend, landlords say the same about merchants,
and merchants about Government officials, and so on.
But this does not disconcert them, and they continue
to assure people that they (each of them) profit by the
labours of others exactly in proportion to the service
they render to others. So that the payment is not
determined by the work, but the value of the imaginary
work is determined by the payment. Thus they assure
one another, but they know perfectly well in the depth of
their souls that all their arguments do not justify them ;
that they are not necessary to the working men, and
that they profit by the labour of these men, not on
account of any division of labour, but simply because
they have the power to do so, and because they are so
spoiled that they cannot do without it.
And all this arises from people imagining that it is
possible to lead a good life without first acquiring the
primary quality necessary for a good life.
And this first quality is self-control.
VIII.
There never has been, and cannot be, a good life
without self-control. Apart from self-control, no good
life is imaginable. The attainment of goodness must
begin with that.
There is a scale of virtues, and it is necessary, if one
would mount the higher steps, to begin with the
lowest ; and the first virtue a man must acquire if he
wishes to acquire the others, is that which the ancients called [greek] or [greek] — i.e., self-control or
moderation.
If, in the Christian teaching, self-control was included
in the conception of self-renunciation, still the order of
succession remained the same, and the acquirement
of no Christian virtue is possible without self-control—
and this not because such a rule has been invented by
any one, but because such is the essential nature of the
case.
But even self-control, the first step in every
righteous life, is not attainable all at once, but only
by degrees.
Self-control is the liberation of man from desires
their subordination to moderation, [greek]. But a
man's desires are many and various, and in order
successfully to contend with them he must begin
with the fundamental ones—those upon which the
more complex ones have grown up—and not with
those complex lusts which have grown up upon the
fundamental ones. There are complex lusts, like that
of the adornment of the body, sports, amusements,
idle talk, inquisitiveness, and many others ; and there
are also fundamental lusts—gluttony, idleness, sexual
love. And one must begin to contend with these lusts
from the beginning : not with the complex, but with
the fundamental ones, and that also in a definite order.
And this order is determined both by the nature of
things and by the tradition of human wisdom.
A man who eats too much cannot strive against laziness,
while a gluttonous and idle man will never he
able to contend with sexual lust. Therefore, according
to all moral teachings, the effort towards self-control
commences with a struggle against the lust of gluttony—commences with fasting. In our time, however, every
serious relation to the attainment of a good life has
been so long and so completely lost, that not only is the
very first virtue—self-control—without which the others
are unattainable, regarded as superfluous, hut the order
of succession necessary for the attainment of this first
virtue is also disregarded, and fasting is quite forgotten, or is looked upon as a silly superstition, utterly unnecessary.
And yet, just as the first condition of a good life is
self-control, so the first condition of a life of self-control
is fasting.
One may wish to be good, one may dream of goodness,
without fasting ; but to be good without fasting is
as impossible as it is to advance without getting up on
to one's feet.
Fasting is an indispensable condition of a good life,
whereas gluttony is, and always has been, the first sign
of the opposite—a bad life ; and, unfortunately, this vice
is in the highest degree characteristic of the life of the
majority of the men of our time.
Look at the faces and figures of the men of our circle
and day— on all those faces with pendent cheeks and
chins, those corpulent limbs and prominent stomachs,
lies the indelible seal of a dissolute life. Nor can it be
otherwise. Consider our life and the actuating motive
of the majority of men in our society, and then ask
yourself, what is the chief interest of this majority.
And, strange as it may appear to us who are accustomed
to hide our real interests and to profess false,
artificial ones, you will find that the chief interest of
their life is the satisfaction of the palate, the pleasure
of eating— gluttony. From the poorest to the richest,
eating is, I think, the chief aim, the chief pleasure, of
our life. Poor working people form an exception, but
only inasmuch as want prevents their addicting themselves
to this passion. No sooner have they the time
and the means, than, in imitation of the higher classes,
they procure what is most tasty and sweet, and eat and
drink as much as they can. The more they eat, the
more do they deem themselves, not only happy, but also
strong and healthy. And in this conviction they are
encouraged by the upper classes, who regard food in
precisely the same way. The educated classes (following
the medical men who assure them that the most
expensive food, flesh, is the most wholesome) imagine
that happiness and health consist in tasty, nourishing, easily digested food—in gorging ; though they try to
conceal this.
Look at rich people's lives, listen to their conversation.
What lofty subjects seem to occupy them :
philosophy, science, art, poetry, the distribution of
wealth, the welfare of the people, and the education of
the young ; but all this is, for the immense majority,
a sham,—all this occupies them in the intervals of
business, real business : between lunch and dinner,
while the stomach is full and it is impossible to eat
more. The only real living interest of the majority
both of men and women, especially after early youth, is
eating—How to eat, what to eat, where and when to eat?
No solemnity, no rejoicing, no consecration, no
opening of anything, can dispense with eating.
Watch people travelling. In their case the thing is
specially evident. ' Museums, libraries, Parliament -
how very interesting! But where shall we dine?
Where is one best fed?' Look at people when they
come together for dinner, dressed up, perfumed, around
a table decorated with flowers—how joyfully they rub
their hands and smile !
If we could look into the hearts of the majority of
people, what should we find they most desire? Appetite
for breakfast and for dinner. What is the severest
punishment from infancy upwards? To be put on
bread and water. What artisans get the highest
wages ? Cooks. What is the chief interest of the
mistress of the house? To what subject does the
conversation of middle-class housewives generally tend?
If the conversation of the members of the higher classes
does not tend in the same direction, it is not because
they are better educated or are occupied with higher
interests, but simply because they have a house-keeper
or a steward who relieves them of all anxiety about
their dinner. But once deprive them of this convenience,
and you will see what causes them most
anxiety. It all comes round to the subject of eating :
the price of grouse, the best way of making coffee, of
baking sweet cakes, etc. People come together - whatever the occasion : a christening, a funeral, a
wedding, the consecration of a church, the departure
or arrival of a friend, the consecration of regimental
colours, the celebration of a memorable day, the death
or birth of a great scientist, philosopher, or teacher of
morality—men come together as if occupied by the
most lofty interests. So they say ; but it is only a
pretence : they all know that there will be eating —good tasty food—and drinking, and it is chiefly this
that brings them together. For several days before,
to this end, animals have been slaughtered, baskets of
provisions brought from gastronomic shops ; cooks and
their helpers, kitchen boys and maids, specially attired
in clean, starched frocks and caps, have been 'at work.'
Chefs, receiving- £50 a month and more, have been
occupied in giving directions. Cooks have been chopping, kneading, roasting, arranging, adorning. With
like solemnity and importance a master of the ceremonies
has been working, calculating, pondering,
adjusting with his eye, like an artist. A gardener has
been employed upon the flowers. Scullery-maids. . . .
An army of men has been at work, the result of
thousands of working days are being: swallowed up, and
all this that people may come together to talk about
some great teacher of science or morality, or to recall
the memory of a deceased friend, or to greet a young
couple just entering upon a new life.
In the middle and lower classes it is perfectly evident
that every festivity, every funeral or wedding, means
gluttony. There the matter is so understood. To
such an extent is gluttony the motive of the assembly
that in Greek and in French the same word means
both 'wedding' and 'feast.' But in the upper classes
of the rich, especially among the refined, who have
long possessed wealth, great skill is used to conceal
this, and to make it appear that eating is a secondary
matter, necessary only for appearance. And this
pretence is easy, as in the majority of cases the guests
are satiated in the true sense of the word—they are
never hungry.
They pretend that dinner, eating, is not necessary to
them, is even a burden ; but this a lie. Try giving
them—instead of the refined dishes they expect, I do
not say bread and water, but—porridge or gruel or
something of that kind, and see what a storm it will
call forth, and how evident will become the real truth,
namely, that the chief interest of the assembly is, not
the ostensible one, but—gluttony.
Look at what men sell ; go through a town and see
what men buy—articles of adornment and things to
devour. And indeed this must be so, it cannot be
otherwise. It is only possible not to think about eating,
to keep this lust under control, when a man does
not eat except in obedience to necessity ; but if a man
ceases to eat only in obedience to necessity— i.e., when
the stomach is full—then the state of things cannot
but be what it actually is. If men love the pleasure of
eating, if they allow themselves to love this pleasure,
if they find it good (as is the case with the vast majority
of men in our time, and with educated men quite as
much as with uneducated, although they pretend that
it is not so), there is no limit to the augmentation of
this pleasure, no limit beyond which it may not grow.
The satisfaction of a need has limits, but pleasure has
none. For the satisfaction of our needs it is necessary
and sufficient to eat bread, porridge, or rice ; for the
augmentation of pleasure there is no end to the
possible flavourings and seasonings.
Bread is a necessary and sufficient food. (This is
proved by the millions of men who are strong, active,
healthy, and hard-working on rye bread alone.) But
it is pleasanter to eat bread with some flavouring. It
is well to soak the bread in water boiled with meat.
Still better to put into this water some vegetable or,
better yet, several vegetables. It is well to eat flesh.
And flesh is better not stewed, but roasted ; and it is
better still with butter, and underdone, and choosing
out certain special parts of the meat. But add to this
vegetables and mustard. And drink wine with it, red
wine for preference. One does not need anymore, but one can yet eat some fish if it is well flavoured with sauces and swallowed down with white wine. It would
seem as if one could get through nothing more, either
rich or tasty, but a sweet dish can still be managed : in
summer ices, in winter stewed fruits, preserves, etc.
And thus we have a dinner, a modest dinner. The
pleasure of such a dinner can be greatly augmented.
And it is augmented, and there is no limit to this augmentation
: stimulating snacks, hors-d'oeuvres before
dinner, and entremets and desserts, and various combinations
of tasty things, and flowers and decorations
and music during dinner.
And, strange to say, men who daily overeat themselves
at such dinners—in comparison with which the
feast of Belshazzar, that evoked the prophetic warning,
was nothing—are naively persuaded that they may yet
be leading a moral life.
IX.
Fasting is an indispensable condition of a good life ;
but in fasting, as in self-control in general, the question
arises, with what shall we begin?'—How to fast,
how often to eat, what to eat, what to avoid eating? And
as we can do no work seriously without regarding the
necessary order of sequence, so also we cannot fast without
knowing where to begin—with what to commence
self-control in food.
Fasting ! And even an analysis of how to fast, and
where to begin ! The notion seems ridiculous and wild
to the majority of men.
I remember how, with pride at his originality, an
Evangelical preacher, who was attacking monastic
asceticism, once said to me, 'Ours is not a Christianity
of fasting and privations, but of beefsteaks.' Christianity,
or virtue in general—and beefsteaks !
During a long period of darkness and lack of all
guidance. Pagan or Christian, so many wild, immoral
ideas have made their way into our life (especially into that lower region of the first steps toward a good life —
our relation to food, to which no one paid any attention), that it is difficult for us even to understand the
audacity and senselessness of upholding in our days,
Christianity or virtue with beefsteaks.
We are not horrified by this association, solely because
a strange thing has befallen us. We look and see not
listen and hear not. There is no bad odour, no sound,
no monstrosity, to which man cannot become so accustomed that he ceases to remark what would strike a
man unaccustomed to it. Precisely so it is in the moral
region. Christianity and morality with beefsteaks !
A few days ago I visited the slaughter-house in our
town of Toúla. It is built on the new and improved
system practised in large towns, with a view to causing
the animals as little suffering as possible. It was on a
Friday, two days before Trinity Sunday. There were
many cattle there.
Long before this, when reading that excellent book.
The Ethics of Diet, 1 had wished to visit a slaughter-house,
in order to see with my own eyes the reality of
the question raised when vegetarianism is discussed.
But at first I felt ashamed to do so, as one is always
ashamed of going to look at suffering which one knows
is about to take place, but which one cannot avert ; and
so I kept putting off my visit.
But a little while ago I met on the road a butcher
returning to Toúla after a visit to his home. He is not
yet an experienced butcher, and his duty is to stab with
a knife. I asked him whether he did not feel sorry for
the animals that he killed. He gave me the usual
answer :
'Why should I feel sorry.? It is necessary.'
But when I told him that eating flesh is not necessary,
but is only a luxury, he agreed ; and then he admitted
that he was sorry for the animals. 'But what can I
do? I must earn my bread,' he said. 'At first I was
afraid to kill. My father, he never even killed a
chicken in all his life.' The majority of Russians
cannot kill ; they feel pity, and express the feeling by
the word 'fear.' This man had also been 'afraid,' but
he was so no longer. He told me that most of the work was done on Fridays, when it continues until the
evening.
Not long ago I also had a talk with a retired soldier,
a butcher, and he, too, was surprised at my assertion
that it was a pity to kill, and said the usual things
about its being ordained ; but afterwards he agreed
with me : 'Especially when they are quiet, tame
cattle. They come, poor things ! trusting you. It
is very pitiful.'
This is dreadful ! Not the suffering and death of the
animals, but that man suppresses in himself, unnecessarily, the highest spiritual capacity—that of sympathy
and pity toward living creatures like himself—and by
violating his own feelings becomes cruel. And how
deeply seated in the human heart is the injunction not
to take life !
Once, when walking; from Moscow, (3) I was offered a
lift by some carters who were going from Sérpouhof to
a neighbouring, forest to fetch wood. It was the
Thursday before Easter. 1 was seated in the first cart,
with a strong, red, coarse carman, who evidently drank.
On entering a village we saw a well-fed, naked, pink
pig being dragged out of the first yard to be slaughtered.
It squealed in a dreadful voice, resembling the shriek
of a man. Just as we were passing they began to kill
it. A man gashed its throat with a knife. The pig
squealed still more loudly and piercingly, broke away
from the men, and ran off covered with blood. Being
near-sighted I did not see all the details. I saw only
the human-looking pink body of the pig and heard its
desperate squeal ; but the carter saw all the details
and watched closely. They caught the pig, knocked
it down, and finished cutting: its throat. When its
squeals ceased the carter sighed heavily. 'Do men
really not have to answer for such things?' he said.
So strong is man's aversion to all killing. But by example, by encouraging greediness, by the assertion
that God has allowed it, and, above all, by habit, people
entirely lose this natural feeling.
On Friday I decided to go to Toúla, and, meeting a
meek, kind acquaintance of mine, I invited him to
accompany me.
'Yes, I have heard that the arrangements are good,
and have been wishing to go and see it ; but if they are slaughtering I will not go in.'
'Why not? That's just what I want to see ! If we
eat flesh it must be killed.'
'No, no, I cannot !'
It is worth remarking that this man is a sportsman
and himself kills animals and birds.
So we went to the slaughter-house. Even at the
entrance one noticed the heavy, disgusting, fetid smell,
as of carpenter's glue, or paint on glue. The nearer
we approached, the stronger became the smell. The
building is of red brick, very large, with vaults and
high chimneys. We entered the gates. To the right
was a spacious enclosed yard, three-quarters of an acre
in extent— twice a week cattle are driven in here for
sale— and adjoining this enclosure was the porter's
lodge. To the left were the chambers, as they are
called—
i.e., rooms with arched entrances, sloping
asphalt floors, and contrivances for moving and hanging
up the carcasses. On a bench against the wall of
the porter's lodge were seated half a dozen butchers,
in aprons covered with blood, their tucked-up sleeves
disclosing their muscular arms also besmeared with
blood. They had finished their work half an hour
before, so that day we could only see the empty chambers.
Though these chambers were open on both
sides, there was an oppressive smell of warm blood ;
the floor was brown and shining, with congealed black
blood in the cavities.
One of the butchers described the process of slaughtering,
and showed us the place where it was done. I
did not quite understand him, and formed a wrong, but very horrible, idea of the way the animals are
slaughtered ; and I fancied that, as is often the case,
the reality would very likely produce upon me a
weaker impression than the imagination, but in this
I was mistaken.
The next time I visited the slaughter-house I went
in good time. It was the Friday before Trinity—
a
warm day in June. The smell of glue and blood was
even stronger and more penetrating than on my first
visit. The work was at its height. The dusty yard
was full of cattle, and animals had been driven into all
the enclosures beside the chambers.
In the street, before the entrance, stood carts to
which oxen, calves, and cows were tied. Other carts
drawn by good horses and filled with live calves, whose
heads hung down and swayed about, drew up and were
unloaded ; and similar carts containing the carcasses of
oxen, with trembling logs sticking out, with heads and
bright red lungs and brown livers, drove away from
the slaughter-house. By the fence stood the cattle dealers'
horses. The dealers themselves, in their long
coats, with their whips and knouts in their hands, were
walking about the yard, either marking with tar cattle
belonging to the same owner, or bargaining, or else
guiding oxen and bulls from the great yard into the
enclosures which lead into the chambers. These men
were evidently all preoccupied with money matters and
calculations, and any thought as to whether it was right
or wrong to kill these animals was as far from their
minds as were questions about the chemical composition
of the blood that covered the floor of the chambers.
No butchers were to be seen in the yard ; they were
all in the chambers at work. That day about a hundred
head of cattle were slaughtered. I was on the point
of entering one of the chambers, but stopped short at
the door. I stopped both because the chamber was
crowded with carcasses which were being moved about,
and also because blood was flowing on the floor and
dripping from above. All the butchers present were
besmeared with blood, and had I entered I, too, should certainly have been covered with it. One suspended
carcass was being taken down, another was being
moved toward the door, a third, a slaughtered ox, was
lying with its white legs raised, while a butcher with
strong hand was ripping up its tight-stretched hide.
Through the door opposite the one at which I was
standing, a big, red, well-fed ox was led in. Two men
were dragging it, and hardly had it entered when I
saw a butcher raise a knife above its neck and stab it.
The ox, as if all four legs had suddenly given way, fell
heavily upon its belly, immediately turned over on one
side, and began to work its legs and all its hindquarters.
Another butcher at once threw himself upon
the ox from the side opposite to the twitching legs,
caught its horns and twisted its head down to the
ground, while another butcher cut its throat with a
knife. From beneath the head there flowed a stream
of blackish-red blood, which a besmeared boy caught
in a tin basin. All the time this was going on the ox
kept incessantly twitching its head as if trying to get
up, and waved its four legs in the air. The basin was
quickly filling, but the ox still lived, and, its stomach
heaving heavily, both hind and fore legs worked so
violently that the butchers held aloof. When one
basin was full, the boy carried it away on his head to
the albumen factory, while another boy placed a fresh
basin, which also soon began to till up. But still the
ox heaved its body and worked its hind legs.
When the blood ceased to flow the butcher raised the
animal's head and began to skin it. The ox continued
to writhe. The head, stripped of its skin, showed red
with white veins, and kept the position given it by the
butcher ; on both sides hung the skin. Still the
animal did not cease to writhe. Then another butcher
caught hold of one of the legs, broke it, and cut it off.
In the remaining legs and the stomach the convulsions
still continued. The other legs were cut off and thrown
aside, together with those of other oxen belonging to
the same owner. Then the carcass was dragged to the
hoist and hung up, and the convulsions were over.
Thus I looked on from the door at the second, third,
fourth ox. It was the same with each : the same
cutting off of the head with bitten tongue, and the
same convulsed members. The only difference was
that the butcher did not always strike at once so as
to cause the animal's fall. Sometimes he missed his
aim, whereupon the ox leaped up, bellowed, and,
covered with blood, tried to escape. But then his
head was pulled under a bar, struck a second time, and
he fell.
I afterwards entered by the door at which the oxen
were led in. Here I saw the same thing, only nearer,
and therefore more plainly. But chiefly I saw here,
what I had not seen before, how the oxen were forced
to enter this door. Each time an ox was seized in the
enclosure and pulled forward by a rope tied to its horns,
the animal, smelling blood, refused to advance, and
sometimes bellowed and drew back. It would have
been beyond the strength of two men to drag it in by
force, so one of the butchers went round each time,
grasped the animal's tail and twisted it so violently
that the gristle crackled, and the ox advanced.
When they had finished with the cattle of one owner,
they brought in those of another. The first animal of
this next lot was not an ox, but a bull— a fine, well-bred
creature, black, with white spots on its legs, young,
muscular, full of energy. He was dragged forward,
but he lowered his head and resisted sturdily. Then
the butcher who followed behind seized the tail, like
an engine-driver grasping the handle of a whistle,
twisted it, the gristle crackled, and the bull rushed
forward, upsetting; the men who held the rope. Then
it stopped, looking sideways with its black eyes, the
whites of which had filled with blood. But again the
tail crackled, and the bull sprang forward and reached
the required spot. The striker approached, took aim,
and struck. But the blow missed the mark. The bull
leaped up, shook his head, bellowed, and, covered with
blood, broke free and rushed back. The men at the
doorway all sprang aside ; but the experienced butchers, with the dash of men inured to danger, quickly caught
the rope ; again the tail operation was repeated, and
again the bull was in the chamber, where he was
dragged under the bar, from which he did not again
escape. The striker quickly took aim at the spot where
the hair divides like a star, and, notwithstanding the
blood, found it, struck, and the fine animal, full of
life, collapsed, its head and legs writhing while it was
bled and the head skinned.
'There, the cursed devil hasn't even fallen the right
way !' grumbled the butcher as he cut the skin from
the head.
Five minutes later the head was stuck up, red instead
of black, without skin ; the eyes, that had shone with
such splendid colour five minutes before, fixed and
glassy.
Afterwards I went into the compartment where small
animals are slaughtered—a very large chamber with
asphalt floor, and tables with backs, on which sheep
and calves are killed. Here the work was already
finished ; in the long room, impregnated with the
smell of blood, were only two butchers. One was
blowing into the leg of a dead lamb and patting the
swollen stomach with his hand ; the other, a young
fellow in an apron besmeared with blood, was smoking
a bent cigarette. There was no one else in the long,
dark chamber, filled with a heavy smell. After me
there entered a man, apparently an ex-soldier, bringing
in a young yearling ram, black with a white mark on
its neck, and its legs tied. This animal he placed upon
one of the tables, as if upon a bed. The old soldier
greeted the butchers, with whom he was evidently
acquainted, and began to ask when their master allowed
them leave. The fellow with the cigarette approached
with a knife, sharpened it on the edge of the table, and
answered that they were free on holidays. The live
ram was lying as quietly as the dead inflated one,
except that it was briskly wagging its short little tail
and its sides were heaving more quickly than usual.
The soldier pressed down its uplifted head gently, without effort; the butcher, still continuing the conversation,
grasped with his left hand the head of
the ram and cut its throat. The ram quivered, and
the little tail stiffened and ceased to wave. The
fellow, while waiting; for the blood to flow, began to
relight his cigarette, which had gone out. The blood
flowed and the ram began to writhe. The conversation
continued without the slightest interruption. It was
horribly revolting.
* * * * *
And how about those hens and chickens which daily,
in thousands of kitchens, with heads cut off and streaming
with blood, comically, dreadfully, flop about, jerking
their wings ?
And see, a kind, refined lady will devour the carcasses
of these animals with full assurance that she is
doing right, at the same time asserting two contradictory
propositions :
First, that she is, as her doctor assures her, so delicate
that she cannot be sustained by vegetable food
alone, and that for her feeble organism flesh is indispensable
; and, secondly, that she is so sensitive that
she is unable, not only herself to inflict suffering on
animals, but even to bear the sight of suffering.
Whereas the poor lady is weak precisely because she
has been taught to live upon food unnatural to man ;
and she cannot avoid causing suffering to animals—for
she eats them.
X.
We cannot pretend that we do not know this. We
are not ostriches, and cannot believe that if we refuse
to look at what we do not wish to see, it will not exist.
This is especially the case when what we do not wish to
see is what we wish to eat. If it were really indispensable,
or, if not indispensable, at least in some way
useful ! But it is quite unnecessary, (4) and only serves to develop animal feelings, to excite desire, and to
promote fornication and drunkenness. And this is
continually being confirmed by the fact that young,
kind, undepraved people—especially women and girls —without knowing how it logically follows, feel that
virtue is incompatible with beefsteaks, and, as soon as
they wish to be good, give up eating flesh.
What, then, do I wish to say ? That in order
to be moral people must cease to eat meat? Not
at all.
I only wish to say that for a good life a certain order
of good actions is indispensable ; that if a man's aspirations
toward right living be serious they will inevitably
follow one definite sequence ; and that in this sequence
the first virtue a man will strive after will be self-control,
self-restraint. And in seeking for self-control
a man will inevitably follow one definite sequence, and
in this sequence the first thing will be self-control in
food—fasting. And in fasting, if he be really and
seriously seeking to live a good life, the first thing from
which he will abstain will always be the use of animal
food, because, to say nothing of the excitation of the
passions caused by such food, its use is simply immoral,
as it involves the performance of an act which is
contrary to the moral feeling—
killing ; and is called
forth only by greediness and the desire for tasty
food.
The precise reason why abstinence from animal food will be the first act of fasting and of a moral life is
admirably explained in the book, The Ethics of Diet ;
and not by one man only, but by all mankind in the
persons of its best representatives during all the conscious
life of humanity.
But why, if the wrongfulness -i.e., the immorality —
of animal food was known to humanity so long ago,
have people not yet come to acknowledge this law?
will be asked by those who are accustomed to be led by
public opinion rather than by reason.
The answer to this question is, that the moral progress
of humanity—which is the foundation of every
other kind of progress—is always slow ; but that the
sign of true, not casual, progress is its uninterruptedness
and its continual acceleration.
And the progress of vegetarianism is of this kind.
That progress, is expressed both in the words of the
writers cited in the above-mentioned book and in the
actual life of mankind, which from many causes is
involuntarily passing metre and more from carnivorous
habits to vegetable food, and is also deliberately
following the same path in a movement which
shows evident strength, and which is growing larger
and larger—viz., vegetarianism, That movement has
during the last ten years advanced more and more
rapidly. More and more books and periodicals on this
subject appear every year ; one meets more and more
people who have given up meat ; and abroad, especially
in Germany, England, and America, the number of
vegetarian hotels and restaurants increases year by
year.
This movement should cause especial joy to those
whose life lies in the effort to bring about the kingdom
of God on earth, not because vegetarianism is in itself
an important step towards that kingdom (all true steps
are both important and unimportant), but because it is
a sign that the aspiration of mankind toward moral
perfection is serious and sincere, for it has taken the one
unalterable order of succession natural to it, beginning
with the first step
One cannot fail to rejoice at this, as people could not
fail to rejoice who, after striving to reach the upper
story of a house by trying vainly and at random to
climb the walls from different points, should at last
assemble at the first step of the staircase and crowd
towards it, convinced that there can be no way up except
by mounting this first step of the stairs.
[1892]
The above essay was written as Preface to a Russian
translation of Howard Williams' The Ethics of Diet.
Footnotes
