Part 1 (1/2)
What Shall We Do?
by Leo Tolstoy.
”And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then?
”He answereth and said unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise.” (Luke iii. 10, 11.)
”Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:
”But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:
”For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
”The light of the body is the eye; if, therefore, thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.
”But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness.
If, therefore, the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is your darkness?
”No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve G.o.d and mammon.
”Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?” (Matt. vi. 19-25.)
”Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
”(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek): for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
”But seek ye first the kingdom of G.o.d, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matt. vi. 31-33.)
”For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of G.o.d.” (Luke xviii. 25.)
CHAPTER I
After having pa.s.sed the greater part of my life in the country, I came at length, in the year 1881, to reside in Moscow, where I was immediately struck with the extreme state of pauperism in that city.
Though well acquainted with the privations of the poor in rural districts, I had not the faintest conception of their actual condition in towns.
In Moscow it is impossible to pa.s.s a street without meeting beggars of a peculiar kind, quite unlike those in the country, who go about there, as the saying is, ”with a bag and the name of Christ.”
The Moscow beggars neither carry a bag nor ask for alms. In most cases when they meet you, they try to catch your eye, and then act according to the expression of your face.
I know of one such, a bankrupt gentleman. He is an old man who advances slowly, limping painfully with each leg. When he meets you, he limps, and makes a bow. If you stop, he takes off his cap, ornamented with a c.o.c.kade, bows again, and begs. If you do not stop, he pretends to be only lame, and continues limping along.
That is a specimen of a genuine Moscow beggar, an experienced one.
At first I did not know why such mendicants did not ask openly; but afterwards I learned why, without understanding the reason.
One day I saw a policeman push a ragged peasant swollen with dropsy, into a cab. I asked what he had been doing, and the policeman replied,--