The Complete Works of Count Tolstoy; The Kingdom of God Is Within You Christianity and Patriotism Miscellanies Volume 20 (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: REASON AND RELIGION You ask me: 1. Should people who are not particularly advanced mentally seek an expression in words for the truths of the inner life, as comprehended by them ? i 2. Is it worth while in one's inner life to strive after complete consciousness ? 3. What are we to be guided by in moments of struggle and wavering, that we may know whether it is indeed our conscience that is speaking in us, or whether it is reflection, which is bribed by our weakness ? (The third question I for brevity's sake expressed in my own words, without having changed its meaning, I hope.) These three questions in my opinion reduce themselves to one, ? the second, because, if it is not necessary for us to strive after a full consciousness of our inner life, it will be alsojinnecessary and impossible for us to express in words,.jifl.Jxaths which we iaye grasped, and in moments of wavering we shall have nothing to be guided by, in order to ascertain whether it is our conscience or a false reflection that is speaking within us. But if it is necessary to strive after the greatest consciousness accessible to human reason (whatever this reason may be), it is also necessary to express the truths grasped by us in words, and it is these expressed truths which have been carried into full consciousness that we have to be guided by in moments of struggle and wavering. And so I answer yourradical question in the affirmative, namely, that every man, for the fulfilment of his destiny upon earth and for the attainment of the true good (the two things go together), must strain all the forces of his mind for the purpose of elucidating to himself those religious bases by which he lives, that is, the meaning of his life. I have frequently met among illiterate earth-diggers, who have to figure out ...