Why on me? I am not going to throw the bomb. And then, what have I got to do with them--I mean the people that get killed? What concern are they of mine? There are plenty of people in the world. You can't kill them all, no matter how many bombs you throw. SAVVA Aren't you sorry for them? KONDRATY If I were to be sorry for everybody, I should have no sympathy left for myself. SAVVA That's right. You are a bright man. You have a good mind. I have already told you so. And yet you hesitate. You are clever, and yet you are afraid to smash a piece of wood. KONDRATY If it is nothing but a piece of wood, then why go to so much trouble about it? The point is, it is not a piece of wood, it is an image. SAVVA For me it is a piece of wood. For the people it is a sacred object. That is why I want to destroy it. Imagine how they'll open their mouths and stare. Ah, brother, if you were not a coward, I would tell you some things. KONDRATY Go ahead and talk. It's no sin to listen. I am not a coward either. I am simply careful. SAVVA This would only be the beginning, brother. KONDRATY A good beginning, I won't deny it. And what will be the end? SAVVA The earth stripped naked, a _tabula rasa_, do you understand? And on this naked earth, naked man, naked as his mother bore him. No breeches on him, no orders, no pockets, nothing. Imagine men without pockets. Queer, isn't it? Yes indeed, brother, the ikon is only the beginning. KONDRATY Oh, they'll make new ones. SAVVA But they won't be the same as before. And they'll never forget this much--that dynamite is mightier than their God, and that man is mightier than dynamite. Look at them; see them yonder praying and kneeling, not daring to raise their heads and look you straight in the face, mean slaves that they are! Then comes a real man, and smash goes the whole humbug. Done for! KONDRATY Really! SAVVA And when a dozen of their idols have gone the same way, the slaves will begin to understand that the kingdom of their God is at an end, and that the kingdom of man has come. Lots of them will drop from sheer terror. Some will lose their wits, and others will throw themselves into the fire. They'll say that Antichrist has come. Think of it, Kondraty! KONDRATY And aren't you sorry for them? SAVVA Sorry for them? Why, they built a prison for me, and I am to be sorry for them. They put me in a torture chamber, and I am to be sorry for them. Bah! KONDRATY Who are you to be above pity? SAVVA I? I am a man who have been born. And having been born, I began to look about. I saw churches and penitentiaries. I saw universities and houses of prostitution. I saw factories and picture galleries. I saw palaces and filthy dens. I calculated the number of prisons there are to each gallery, and I resolved that the whole edifice must go, the whole of it must be overturned, annihilated. And we are going to do it. Our day of reckoning has come. It is time. KONDRATY Who are "we"? SAVVA