_In defence of righteousness_.--Inexperienced and ingenuous people see in righteousness merely a burden which lofty people have assumed out of respect for law or for some other high and inexplicable reason. But a righteous man has not only duties but rights. True, sometimes, when the law is against him, he has to compromise. Yet how rarely does the law desert him! No cruelty matters in him, so long as he does not infringe the statutes. Nay, he will ascribe his cruelty as a merit to himself, since he acts out of no personal considerations, but in the name of sacred justice. No matter what he may do, once he is sanctioned he sees in his actions only merit, merit, merit. Modesty forbids him to say too much--but if he were to let go, what a luxurious panegyric he might deliver to himself! Remembering his works, he praises himself at all times; not aloud, but inwardly. The nature of virtue demands it: man must rejoice in his morality and ever keep it in mind. And after that, people declare that it is hard to be righteous. Whatever the other virtues may be, certainly righteousness has its selfish side. As a rule it is decidedly worth while to make considerable sacrifices in order later on to enjoy in calm confidence all that surety and those rights bestowed on a man by morality and public approval. Look at a German who has paid his contribution to a society for the assistance of the indigent. Not one stray farthing will he give, not to a poor wretch who is starving before his eyes. And in this he feels right. This is righteousness out and out: pay your tax and enjoy the privileges of a high-principled man. So righteousness is much in vogue with cultured, commercial nations. Russians have not quite got there. They are afraid of the exactions of righteousness, not guessing the enormous advantages derived. A Russian has a permanent relationship with his conscience, which costs him far more than the most moral German, or even Englishman, has to pay for his righteousness. 12 The best way of getting rid of tedious, played-out truths is to stop paying them the tribute of respect and to treat them with a touch of easy familiarity and derision. To put into brackets, as Dostoevsky did, such words as good, self-sacrifice, progress, and so on, will alone achieve you much more than many brilliant arguments would do. Whilst you still contest a certain truth, you still believe in it, and this even the least penetrating individual will perceive. But if you favour it with no serious attention, and only throw out a scornful remark now and then, the result is different. It is evident you have ceased to be afraid of the old truth, you no longer respect it. And this sets people thinking. 13