But under the stress of his daily life he, a truthful man, allowed a little falsehood to creep in.  He said that in order to do justice to an unreasonable thing one had to study the unreasonable thing.  It was a little falsehood, but it sunk him into the big falsehood in which he was now caught.

Before putting to himself the question whether the orthodoxy in which he was born and bred, and which every one expected him to accept, and without which he could not continue his useful occupation, contained the truth, he had already decided the answer.  And to clear up the question he did not read Voltaire, Schopenhauer, Herbert Spencer, or Comte, but the philosophical works of Hegel and the religious works of Vinet and Khomyakoff, and naturally found in them what he wanted, i.e., something like peace of mind and a vindication of that religious teaching in which he was educated, which his reason had long ceased to accept, but without which his whole life was filled with unpleasantness which could all be removed by accepting the teaching.

And so he adopted all the usual sophistries which go to prove that a single human reason cannot know the truth, that the truth is only revealed to an association of men, and can only be known by revelation, that revelation is kept by the church, etc.  And so he managed to be present at prayers, masses for the dead, to confess, make signs of the cross in front of icons, with a quiet mind, without being conscious of the lie, and to continue in the service which gave him the feeling of being useful and some comfort in his joyless family life.  Although he believed this, he felt with his entire being that this religion of his, more than all else, was not “the right thing,” and that is why his eyes always looked sad.

And seeing Nekhludoff, whom he had known before all these lies had rooted themselves within him, reminded him of what he then was.  It was especially after he had hurried to hint at his religious views that he had most strongly felt all this “not the right thing,” and had become painfully sad.  Nekhludoff felt it also after the first joy of meeting his old friend had passed, and therefore, though they promised each other to meet, they did not take any steps towards an interview, and did not again see each other during this stay of Nekhludoff’s in Petersburg.

CHAPTER XXIV.

MARIETTE TEMPTS NEKHLUDOFF.

When they left the Senate, Nekhludoff and the advocate walked on together, the advocate having given the driver of his carriage orders to follow them.  The advocate told Nekhludoff the story of the chief of a Government department, about whom the Senators had been talking:  how the thing was found out, and how the man, who according to law should have been sent to the mines, had been appointed Governor of a town in Siberia.  Then he related with particular pleasure how several high-placed persons stole a lot