_Solomon_ (alone): Oh! how dark is life! No night, when I was a child, so terrified me by its darkness as does my invisible existence. Lord, to David my father thou gavest only the gift of harmonizing words and sounds, to sing and praise thee on strings, to lament sweetly, to make people weep or admire beauty; but why hast thou given me a meditative, sleepless, hungry mind? Like an insect born of the dust, I hide in darkness; and in fear and despair, all shaking and shivering, I see and hear in everything an invisible mystery. Why this morning? Why does the sun come out from behind the temple and gild the palm tree? Why this beauty of women? Where does the bird hurry, what is the meaning of its flight, if it and its young and the place to which it hastens will, like myself, turn to dust? It were better I had never been born or were a stone, to which God has given neither eyes nor thoughts. In order to tire out my body by nightfall, all day yesterday, like a mere workman I carried marble to the temple; but now the night has come and I cannot sleep ... I'll go and lie down. Phorses told me that if one imagines a flock of sheep running and fixes one's attention upon it, the mind gets confused and one falls asleep, I'll do it ...(exit).] * * * * * Ordinary hypocrites pretend to be doves; political and literary hypocrites pretend to be eagles. But don't be disconcerted by their aquiline appearance. They are not eagles, but rats or dogs. * * * * * Those who are more stupid and more dirty than we are called the people. The administration classifies the population into taxpayers and non-taxpayers. But neither classification will do; we are all the people and all the best we are doing is the people's work. * * * * * If the Prince of Monaco has a roulette table, surely convicts may play at cards. * * * * * Iv. (Chekhov's brother Ivan) could philosophize about love, but he could not love. * * * * * _Aliosha_: "My mind, mother, is weakened by illness and I am now like a child: now I pray to God, now I cry, now I am happy." * * * * * Why did Hamlet trouble about ghosts after death, when life itself is haunted by ghosts so much more terrible? * * * * * _Daughter_: "Felt boots are not the correct thing." _Father_: "Yes they are clumsy, I'll have to get leather ones." The father fell ill and his deportation to Siberia was postponed. _Daughter_: "You are not at all ill, father. Look, you have your coat and boots on...." _Father_: "I long to be exiled to Siberia. One could sit somewhere by the Yenissey or Obi river and fish, and on the ferry there would be nice little convicts, emigrants.... Here I hate everything: this lilac tree in front of the window, these gravel paths...." * * * * *