“The idea of amassing money,” one of the hidden thoughts of _The Great Sinner_, had early engrossed the attention of the greatest martyr in the ranks of poverty-stricken writers, who all his life long was in need of money and passionately awaited the chance of living and working in conditions of security like Tolstoi and Turgenev. “Money and security are good things. When shall I get rid of my debts?” “Money—I have not one brass farthing.” “It is very painful.” “If you can save me, do.” “I am again in such straits as to be ready to hang myself.” “I am really in an awful state now.... I have not got a farthing.” “All my life I have worked for money, and all my life I have been constantly in need.” “How can I write when I am hungry?... Damn myself and my hunger. But my wife is nursing, and she _herself_ has to go and pawn her last woollen skirt. And it has been snowing now for two days. And then they ask me for artistry, for purity of poetry, without strain, without violence, and they point to Turgenev and Goncharov! Let them only see in what conditions I work ... ”—that is the cry, echoing like a groan through Dostoevsky’s letters at various periods of his life, particularly when he was abroad, and during the years when _The Life of a Great Sinner_ was being shaped. We have to suppose that the religious problem was being solved by Dostoevsky much in the same way as it was in the life of the hero of the novel—by “stretches” of belief and unbelief. An analysis of _The Life_ which reveals the autobiographic substratum lets us see with greater certainty the _personal_ traits in those other novels of Dostoevsky’s into which _The Life of a Great Sinner_ split off. Versilov’s son, born Dolgorukov (_The Raw Youth_), with his “idea of discipline,” approaches the character in Dostoevsky’s unwritten novel who in this respect, by the way, is akin to Stavrogin. The hero of _The Possessed_, with his falls, “abysses,” and depravity, is also akin to the Great Sinner. The pages about “Tushar’s” boarding-school, the exposed child, the figure of Lambert in _The Raw Youth_, are taken from _The Life_. In certain particulars the Great Sinner approaches Ivan Karamazov and Dmitri Karamazov. Tikhon of _The Life_ passed into _The Possessed_ and _Brothers Karamazov_ in the characters of the Bishop and of the old monk Zosima.[112] Footnote 112: A few expressions, typical of Dostoevsky, are found in _The Life_ and in his later works: thus, the expression “sacrifice of life” found place there and in _Brothers Karamazov_ (Part I. Book I. chap. v. p. 33; third edition of F. M. Dostoevsky’s Works).