Page 817 - the-idiot

oughly into matters—don’t care to understand things. We
are all like this—you and I, and all of them! Why, here are
you, now—you are not a bit angry with me for calling you
odd,’ are you? And, if so, surely there is good material in
you? Do you know, I sometimes think it is a good thing to be
odd. We can forgive one another more easily, and be more
humble. No one can begin by being perfect—there is much
one cannot understand in life at first. In order to attain to
perfection, one must begin by failing to understand much.
And if we take in knowledge too quickly, we very likely are
not taking it in at all. I say all this to you—you who by this
time understand so much—and doubtless have failed to un-
derstand so much, also. I am not afraid of you any longer.
You are not angry that a mere boy should say such words to
you, are you? Of course not! You know how to forget and to
forgive. You are laughing, Ivan Petrovitch? You think I am a
champion of other classes of people—that I am THEIR ad-
vocate, a democrat, and an orator of Equality?’ The prince
laughed hysterically; he had several times burst into these
little, short nervous laughs. ‘Oh, no—it is for you, for myself,
and for all of us together, that I am alarmed. I am a prince
of an old family myself, and I am sitting among my peers;
and I am talking like this in the hope of saving us all; in
the hope that our class will not disappear altogether—into
the darkness—unguessing its danger—blaming everything
around it, and losing ground every day. Why should we dis-
appear and give place to others, when we may still, if we
choose, remain in the front rank and lead the battle? Let us
be servants, that we may become lords in due season!’

1 The Idiot