"Are they created only for toil and drunkenness? Each one is a receptacle of a living soul. Each one could hasten the development of the thought which would free us from the bondage of confusion, yet they must travel along the same dark and narrow channel through which the days of their fathers flowed turbidly. They are ordered to work and forbidden to think. Many of them, perhaps all, pledge allegiance to dead strength and serve it. Here lies the source of earth's misery. There is no freedom for the growth of the human soul."
He talked while several young boys walked alongside of him and listened to his words. Their attentiveness was amusing. What could these young sprouts of life understand by his words? I remembered my own teacher. He beat the children on the head with a ruler and would come to school drunk.
"Life is filled with fear," Mikhail said, "and mutual hatred eats out the soul of man. A hideous life. But only give the children time to develop freely; do not transform them into beasts of burden, and free and alert, they will light up life both from within and without with the exquisite young fire of their proud souls and the great beauty of their eternal activity."
Their blond heads, their blue eyes, their red cheeks were around us like live flowers among the dark green pines. The laughter and clear voices of these gay birds rang out—these harbingers of new life. And all this vital beauty would be trampled down by greed! What sense was there in that? A delicate child is born rejoicing. He grows into a beautiful child, and then, as a grown-up man, he swears vulgarly and groans bitterly, beats his wife and drowns his sorrow in vodka. And as an answer to my thought, Mikhail said:
"They go on destroying the people—the one and true temple of the living God. And the destroyers themselves sinking in the chaos of the ruins, see their wicked work and cry out, 'Horrible!' They rush hither and thither and whine, 'Where is God?' while they themselves have killed Him."
I remembered Juna's words about the breaking up of the Russian people, and my thoughts followed Mikhail's words lightly and pleasantly. But I could not understand why he spoke low and without anger, as if this whole oppressive life was a thing of the past for him.
The earth breathed warm and friendly, with the intoxicating perfumes of the sap and the flowers. The birds pierced the air with their twitter, the children played about and conquered the stillness of the wood, and it became more and more clear to me that before this day I had not understood their strength, nor had I ever seen their beauty. It was good to see Mikhail among them, with his calm smile on his face. I said, smiling:
"I am going to leave you for a little. I have to think."
He looked at me. His eyes beamed, his eyelashes fluttered, and my heart answered him, trembling. I had seen little of friendship, but I knew how to value it.
"You are a good man," I said to him.