The Brothers Karamazov

“What are you talking about?” Mitya looked at him somehow indefinitely. “Ah, yes, the trial! Devil take it! Up to now we’ve been talking about trifles, about this trial and all, and I haven’t said a word to you about the most important thing. Yes, tomorrow is the trial, but I didn’t say my head would roll because of the trial. It’s not my head that will roll, but what was in my head. Why are you looking at me with such criticism on your face?”

“What are you talking about, Mitya?”

“Ideas, ideas, that’s what! Ethics. What is ethics?”

“Ethics?” Alyosha said in surprise.

“Yes, what is it, some sort of science?”

“Yes, there is such a science ... only ... I must confess I can’t explain to you what sort of science it is.”

“Rakitin knows. Rakitin knows a lot, devil take him! He won’t become a monk. He’s going to go to Petersburg. There, he says, he’ll get into the department of criticism, but with a noble tendency. Why not? He can be useful and make a career. Oof, how good they are at making careers! Devil take ethics! But I am lost, Alexei, I’m lost, you man of God! I love you more than anyone. My heart trembles at you, that’s what. Who is this Carl Bernard?”

“Carl Bernard?” Again Alyosha was surprised.

“No, not Carl, wait, I’ve got it wrong: Claude Bernard.^[293] What is it? Chemistry or something?”

“He must be a scientist,” Alyosha replied, “only I confess I’m not able to say much about him either. I’ve just heard he’s a scientist, but what kind I don’t know.”

“Well, devil take him, I don’t know either,” Mitya swore. “Some scoundrel, most likely. They’re all scoundrels. But Rakitin will squeeze himself in, he’ll squeeze himself through some crack—another Bernard. Oof, these Bernards! How they breed!”

“But what’s the matter with you?” Alyosha asked insistently.

“He wants to write an article about me, about my case, and begin his role in literature that way, that’s why he keeps coming, he explained it to me himself. He wants something with a tendency: ‘It was impossible for him not to kill, he was a victim of his environment,’ and so on, he explained it to me. It will have a tinge of socialism, he says. So, devil take him, let it have a tinge, it’s all the same to me. He doesn’t like brother Ivan, he hates him, you’re not in favor with him either. Well, and I don’t throw him out because he’s an intelligent man. He puts on airs too much, however. I was telling him just now: ‘The Karamazovs are not scoundrels, but philosophers, because all real Russians are philosophers, and you, even though you’ve studied, are not a philosopher, you’re a stinking churl.’ He laughed, maliciously. And I said to him: de thoughtibus non est disputandum^[294]—a good joke? At least I, too, have joined classicism,” Mitya suddenly guffawed.

“But why are you lost? What were you just saying?” Alyosha interrupted.

“Why am I lost? Hm! The fact is ... on the whole ... I’m sorry for God, that’s why!” “What do you mean, sorry for God?”

“Imagine: it’s all there in the nerves, in the head, there are these nerves in the brain (devil take them!) ... there are little sorts of tails, these nerves have little tails, well, and when they start trembling there ... that is, you see, I look at something with my eyes, like this, and they start trembling, these little tails ... and when they tremble, an image appears, not at once, but in a moment, it takes a second, and then a certain moment appears, as it were, that is, not a moment—devil take the moment—but an image, that is, an object or an event, well, devil take it—and that’s why I contemplate, and then think ... because of the little tails, and not at all because I have a soul or am some sort of image and likeness,^[295] that’s all foolishness. Mikhail explained it to me, brother, just yesterday, and it was as if I got burnt. It’s magnificent, Alyosha, this science! The new man will come, I quite understand that ... And yet, I’m sorry for God!”

“Well, that’s good enough,” said Alyosha.