V.
Yet now advancing steadily, and as if by some interior predetermination,
and eying the mass unfalteringly; he then
threw himself prone upon the wood's last year's leaves, and slid
himself straight into the horrible interspace, and lay there as
dead. He spoke not, for speechless thoughts were in him.
These gave place at last to things less and less unspeakable;
till at last, from beneath the very brow of the beetlings and
the menacings of the Terror Stone came the audible words of
Pierre:—
“If the miseries of the undisclosable things in me, shall ever
unhorse me from my manhood's seat; if to vow myself all
Virtue's and all Truth's, be but to make a trembling, distrusted
slave of me; if Life is to prove a burden I can not bear without
ignominious cringings; if indeed our actions are all foreordained,
and we are Russian serfs to Fate; if invisible devils
do titter at us when we most nobly strive; if Life be a cheating
dream, and virtue as unmeaning and unsequeled with any
blessing as the midnight mirth of wine; if by sacrificing myself
for Duty's sake, my own mother re-sacrifices me; if Duty's self
be but a bugbear, and all things are allowable and unpunishable
to man;—then do thou, Mute Massiveness, fall on me! Ages
thou hast waited; and if these things be thus, then wait no
more; for whom better canst thou crush than him who now
lies here invoking thee?”
A down-darting bird, all song, swiftly lighted on the unmoved
and eternally immovable balancings of the Terror Stone,
and cheerfully chirped to Pierre. The tree-boughs bent and
waved to the rushes of a sudden, balmy wind; and slowly
Pierre crawled forth, and stood haughtily upon his feet, as he
owed thanks to none, and went his moody way.
