‘About life. About the destination of man. It can’t be so. I used to think like that, and I have been saved, do you know, by what?—freemasonry. No, you must not smile. Freemasonry is not a religious sect, nor mere ceremonial rites, as I used to suppose; freemasonry is the best, the only expression of the highest, eternal aspects of humanity.’ And he began expounding to Prince Andrey freemasonry, as he understood it.
He said that freemasonry is the teaching of Christianity, freed from its political and religious fetters; the teaching of equality, fraternity, and love.
‘Our holy brotherhood is the only thing that has real meaning in life; all the rest is a dream,’ said Pierre. ‘You understand, my dear fellow, that outside this brotherhood all is filled with lying and falsehood, and I agree with you that there’s nothing left for an intelligent and good-hearted man but, like you, to get through his life, only trying not to hurt others. But make our fundamental convictions your own, enter into our brotherhood, give yourself up to us, let us guide you, and you will at once feel yourself, as I felt, a part of a vast, unseen chain, the origin of which is lost in the skies,’ said Pierre, looking straight before him.
Prince Andrey listened to Pierre’s words in silence. Several times he did not catch words from the noise of the wheels, and he asked Pierre to repeat what he had missed. From the peculiar light that glowed in Prince Andrey’s eyes, and from his silence, Pierre saw that his words were not in vain, that Prince Andrey would not interrupt him nor laugh at what he said.
They reached a river that had overflowed its banks, and had to cross it by a ferry. While the coach and horses waited they crossed on the ferry. Prince Andrey with his elbow on the rail gazed mutely over the stretch of water shining in the setting sun.
‘Well, what do you think about it?’ asked Pierre. ‘Why are you silent?’
‘What do I think? I have heard what you say. That's all right,’ said Prince Andrey. ‘But you say, enter into our brotherhood, and we will show you the object of life and the destination of man, and the laws that
govern the universe. But who are we?—men? How do you know it all? Why is it I alone don’t see what you see? You see on earth the dominion of good and truth, but I don’t see it.’
Pierre interrupted him. ‘Do you believe in a future life?’ he asked.
‘In a future life?’ repeated Prince Andrey.
But Pierre did not give him time to answer, and took this repetition as a negative reply, the more readily as he knew Prince Andrey’s atheistic views in the past. ‘You say that you can’t see the dominion of good and truth on the earth. I have not seen it either, and it cannot be seen if one looks upon our life as the end of everything. On earth, this earth here’ (Pierre pointed to the open country), ‘there is no truth—all is deception and wickedness. But in the world, the whole world, there is a dominion of truth, and we are now the children of earth, but eternally the children of the whole universe. Don’t I feel in my soul that I am a part of that vast, harmonious whole? Don’t I feel that in that vast, innumerable multitude of beings, in which is made manifest the Godhead, the higher power—what you choose to call it—I constitute one grain, one step upward from lower beings to higher ones? If I see, see clearly that ladder that rises up from the vegetable to man, why should I suppose that ladder breaks off with me and does not go on further and further? I feel that I cannot disappear as nothing does disappear in the universe, that indeed I always shall be and always have been. I feel that beside me, above me, there are spirits, and that in their world there is truth.’
‘Yes, that’s Herder’s theory,’ said Prince Andrey. ‘But it’s not that, my dear boy, convinces me; but life and death are what have convinced me. What convinces me is seeing a creature dear to me, and bound up with me, to whom one has done wrong, and hoped to make it right’ (Prince Andrey’s voice shook and he turned away), ‘and all at once that creature suffers, is in agony, and ceases to be. . . . What for? It cannot be that there is no answer! And I believe there is. . . . That’s what convinces, that’s what has convinced me,’ said Prince Andrey.
‘Just so, just so,’ said Pierre; ‘isn’t that the very thing I’m saying?’
‘No. I only say that one is convinced of the necessity of a future life, not by argument, but when one goes hand-in-hand with some one, and all at once that some one slips away yonder into nowhere, and you are left facing that abyss and looking down into it. And I have looked into it . . .’
‘Well, that’s it then! You know there is a yonder and there is some one. Yonder is the future life; Some One is God.’
