The Adolescent полностью

In this lies my “idea,” in this lies its strength, that money is the only path that will bring even a nonentity to the first place. Maybe I’m not a nonentity, but I know from the mirror, for instance, that my appearance does me harm, because my face is ordinary. But if I were as rich as Rothschild—who would question my face, and wouldn’t thousands of women rush to me with their charms if I merely whistled? I’m even certain that, in the end, they themselves would quite sincerely find me handsome. Maybe I’m also intelligent. But even if I had a forehead seven inches wide, there would inevitably turn up in society a man with a forehead eight inches wide, and that would be the end of me. Whereas if I were Rothschild—would this smarty with the eight-inch forehead mean anything next to me? He wouldn’t even be allowed to speak next to me! Maybe I’m witty; yet here next to me is Talleyrand or Piron²⁶—and I’m put in the shade; but once I’m Rothschild—where is Piron, and maybe even Talleyrand? Money is, of course, a despotic power, but at the same time it’s also the highest equalizer, and that is its chief strength. Money equalizes all inequalities. I had already decided all that in Moscow.

You will, of course, see nothing in this thought but impudence, violence, the triumph of nonentity over talent. I agree that it’s a bold thought (and therefore sweet). But so what, so what? Do you think I wished for power then in order to crush unfailingly, to take revenge? That’s just the point, that the ordinary man would unfailingly behave that way. Moreover, I’m certain that if Rothschild’s millions were heaped on them, the thousands of talents and smarties, who are so above it all, would lose control at once and behave like the most banal of ordinary men, and crush more than anybody else. My idea is not that. I’m not afraid of money; it won’t crush me and won’t make me crush others.

I don’t need money, or, better, it’s not money that I need; it’s not even power; I need only what is obtained by power and simply cannot be obtained without power: the solitary and calm awareness of strength! That is the fullest definition of freedom, which the world so struggles over! Freedom! I have finally inscribed that great word . . . Yes, the solitary awareness of strength is fascinating and beautiful. I have strength, and I am calm. Jupiter holds thunder-bolts in his hand, and what then? He’s calm. Do we often hear him thunder? A fool might think he was asleep. But put some writer or foolish peasant woman in Jupiter’s place—oh, what thunder, what thunder there will be!

If only I had power, I reasoned, I’d have no need at all to use it; I assure you that I myself, of my own free will, would take the last place everywhere. If I were Rothschild, I’d go about in an old coat and carry an umbrella. What do I care if I’m jostled in the street, if I’m forced to go skipping through the mud so as not to be run over by cabs? The awareness that it was I, Rothschild himself, would even amuse me at that moment. I know that I can have a dinner like nobody else, and from the world’s foremost chef, and it’s enough for me that I know it. I’ll eat a piece of bread and ham and be satisfied with my awareness. I think so even now.

It’s not I who will get in with the aristocracy, but they who will get in with me; it’s not I who will chase after women, but they who will flow to me like water, offering me everything a woman can offer. The “banal” ones will come running for money, but the intelligent ones will be drawn by curiosity to a strange, proud, closed being, indifferent to everything. I’ll be nice to the ones and to the others, and maybe give them money, but I won’t take anything from them myself. Curiosity gives rise to passion, maybe I’ll also inspire passion. They’ll go away with nothing, I assure you, except perhaps a few presents. I’ll only become twice as curious for them.

... enough for me

Is the awareness of it.²⁷

The strange thing is that this picture (a correct one, by the way) tempted me when I was no more than seventeen.