“Well, first, for the sake of Russianism, let’s say: Russian conversations on these subjects are all conducted as stupidly as possible. And second, then, the stupider, the more to the point. The stupider, the clearer. Stupidity is brief and guileless, while reason hedges and hides. Reason is a scoundrel, stupidity is direct and honest. I brought the case around to my despair, and the more stupidly I’ve presented it, the more it’s to my advantage.”
“Will you explain to me why you ‘do not accept the world’?” said Alyosha.
“Of course I’ll explain, it’s no secret, that’s what I’ve been leading up to. My dear little brother, it’s not that I want to corrupt you and push you off your foundation; perhaps I want to be healed by you,” Ivan suddenly smiled just like a meek little boy. Never before had Alyosha seen him smile that way.
Chapter 4:
“I must make an admission,” Ivan began. “I never could understand how it’s possible to love one’s neighbors. In my opinion, it is precisely one’s neighbors that one cannot possibly love. Perhaps if they weren’t so nigh ... I read sometime, somewhere about ‘John the Merciful’ (some saint) that when a hungry and frozen passerby came to him and asked to be made warm, he lay down with him in bed, embraced him, and began breathing into his mouth, which was foul and festering with some terrible disease.[132] I’m convinced that he did it with the strain of a lie, out of love enforced by duty, out of self-imposed penance. If we’re to come to love a man, the man himself should stay hidden, because as soon as he shows his face—love vanishes.”
“The elder Zosima has spoken of that more than once,” Alyosha remarked. “He also says that a man’s face often prevents many people, who are as yet inexperienced in love, from loving him. But there is still much love in mankind, almost like Christ’s love, I know that, Ivan...”
