Page 1088 - the-brothers-karamazov

even when people are being taken to execution... it’s come
back to me in a dream. You are that dream! You are a dream,
not a living creature!’
‘From the vehemence with which you deny my existence,’
laughed the gentleman, ‘I am convinced that you believe
in me.’
‘Not in the slightest! I haven’t a hundredth part of a grain
of faith in you!’
‘But you have the thousandth of a grain. Homeopathic
doses perhaps are the strongest. Confess that you have faith
even to the ten-thousandth of a grain.’
‘Not for one minute,’ cried Ivan furiously. ‘But I should
like to believe in you,’ he added strangely.
‘Aha! There’s an admission! But I am good-natured. I’ll
come to your assistance again. Listen, it was I caught you,
not you me. I told you your anecdote you’d forgotten, on
purpose, so as to destroy your faith in me completely.’
‘You are lying. The object of your visit is to convince me
of your existence!’
‘Just so. But hesitation, suspense, conflict between belief
and disbelief — is sometimes such torture to a conscien-
tious man, such as you are, that it’s better to hang oneself
at once. Knowing that you are inclined to believe in me, I
administered some disbelief by telling you that anecdote. I
lead you to belief and disbelief by turns, and I have my mo-
tive in it. It’s the new method. As soon as you disbelieve in
me completely, you’ll begin assuring me to my face that I
am not a dream but a reality. I know you. Then I shall have
attained my object, which is an honourable one. I shall sow

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