17Octoberоктября · 17-е октября
Если есть люди и есть бог, то не может не быть отношения между богом и людьми. И то отношение, которое было в древние времена, не важнее, не обязательнее того, которое есть теперь. Теперешнее отношение понятнее и ближе нам, и потому не теперешнее отношение должно быть проверяемо древним, а наоборот.
If there are people and there is God, then there cannot fail to be a relationship between God and people. And the relationship that existed in ancient times is no more important, no more binding, than the one that exists now. The present relationship is more understandable and closer to us, and therefore it is not the present relationship that should be tested by the ancient one, but the other way around.
1. Как удивительно то, что мир терпит и воспринимает из высших откровений истины только самые древние и теперь уже несвоевременные, но всякое прямое откровение, всякую самобытную мысль считает ничтожною и большей частью старательно отвергает.
1. How astonishing it is that the world tolerates and accepts, of the higher revelations of truth, only the most ancient and by now outdated ones, but considers every direct revelation, every original thought, of no account, and for the most part diligently rejects it.
From Journal, 16 November 1851, as printed in Autumn: From the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau, e… · reworded by Tolstoy .
What changedThoreau’s irony, that the world hates any original thought “like virtue,” gives way to plain verbs: it considers every such thought “of no account, and for the most part diligently rejects it”; “the highest intellectual mood which the world tolerates” becomes the world accepting, “of the higher revelations of truth, only the most ancient.”
What Tolstoy read · Every Day with Thoreau, in The Coming DayIt is remarkable that the highest intellectual moods which …
… most ancient revelations, now in some respects out of date ; but any direct revelation, any original thought …
Source text: archive.orgThoreau’s own wordsIt is remarkable that the highest intellectual mood which the world tolerates is the perception of the truth of the most ancient revelations, now in some respects out of date, but any direct revelation, any original thought, it hates like virtue.
Source text: archive.orgDetails
The words shown were found, word for word, in the saved source text. Journal, 16 November 1851, as printed in Autumn: From the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau, ed. H. G. O. Blake (Boston, 1892), p. 280, the entry of 16 November 1851.
Changed in its close. 'It is remarkable that the highest intellectual mood which the world tolerates is the perception of the truth of the most ancient revelations, now in some respects out of date' becomes «Как удивительно то, что мир терпит и воспринимает из высших откровений истины только самые древние и теперь уже несвоевременные» (How remarkable it is that of the highest revelations of truth the world tolerates and accepts only the most ancient, now out of season): 'and accepts' and 'only' are added, and Thoreau's 'highest intellectual mood' becomes 'the highest revelations of truth'. 'Any direct revelation, any original thought, it hates like virtue' becomes «всякое прямое откровение, всякую самобытную мысль считает ничтожною и большей частью старательно отвергает» (every direct revelation, every original thought, it considers worthless and for the most part zealously rejects): the irony of 'hates like virtue' is replaced by two plain verbs. Tolstoy's route was the calendar 'Every Day with Thoreau' in The Coming Day, which prints the sentence for May 5, credited to 'Autumn', with 'moods' for 'mood'; its scan is garbled, so only two pieces of it are quoted. The Jubilee list of the Circle's sources names 'Every day with Thoreau', bound sheets from an unidentified book. The original is quoted from a second scan of Autumn (Boston Public Library's), saved beside the first, whose text breaks 'toler ates' without a hyphen. No printable.
2. Религиозное сознание человечества не неподвижно, а не переставая изменяется, более и более уясняясь и очищаясь.
2. The religious consciousness of humanity is not motionless, but changes unceasingly, becoming ever clearer and purer.
Translation note. The Russian italic is broken only at the commas; it is set here as one span.
3. Когда кто-либо привязывается к одной какой-нибудь, хотя бы и верной, идее, то он в сущности попадает в то же положение, в каком находился бы человек, привязавший себя к столбу, для того, чтобы не заблудиться. То, что может быть желанной истиной на известной ступени духовного роста, может быть помехой к этому росту и заблуждением на другой, более высокой ступени.
3. When anyone becomes attached to some single idea, even a true one, he is in fact in the same position as a man who had tied himself to a post so as not to lose his way. What may be a welcome truth at a certain stage of spiritual growth may be a hindrance to that growth, and an error, at another, higher stage.
Source not found yet .
Related · The World's Advance-Thought and the Universal RepublicAttaching one's self to an idea is like attaching one's self to a stake in the ground.
The measure of liberty will be limited to the length of the thought-rope.
Source text: iapsop.comTolstoy’s own version · Путь жизниКогда человек для того, чтобы не ошибиться в законе жизни не решается отступить от раз признанной им веры, то с ним случается то же, что случилось бы с человеком, который для того, чтобы не заблудиться, привязал бы себя к столбу веревкой.
Source text: tolstoy.ruDetails
Not found yet.
Not found. The image is Mallory's: a Key Thought of May–June 1901 (Related) likens attaching oneself to an idea to attaching oneself to a stake in the ground, and goes on to the length of the 'thought-rope' and the freedom of an idea 'that includes the good of all'. Tolstoy translated that aphorism closely for August 1 (vol. 41: «Привязаться к известной идее это почти то же, что привязаться к столбу, врытому в землю»). October 17's thought is another text: the idea is 'one, even a true one', the post is tied to 'so as not to lose one's way', and its second sentence, that a desired truth at one stage of spiritual growth may be a hindrance and an error at a higher one, was not found in the journal. The Path of Life keeps the first sentence in a third form, signed «Люси Малори» (Tolstoy's version). Many numbers of 1892–1897, 1900, and 1903–1907 are not online.
Searched: The text layers of IAPSOP's PDFs of 108 issues of The World's Advance-Thought (vols. III–VI, 1888–1892, and XI–XXI, March 1897 to December 1907: every issue IAPSOP holds for those years) and the saved archive.org scans of vols. II–VI, XIV–XVI and XIX–XXII (to 1909), by phrase and by 450-character windows scored on groups of keywords: 'post', 'stake', 'pillar', 'pole', or 'anchor' near 'idea', 'truth', 'belief', 'creed', or 'doctrine'; 'tie(d)', 'tether(ed)', 'bind', or 'chain' with 'himself' or 'oneself'; 'getting lost', 'lose his way', 'go astray', 'get lost'; 'one idea', 'single idea', 'one truth' near 'cling', 'attach', or 'hold'; 'truth' near 'stage', 'plane', or 'step' of growth or development and 'hindrance', 'obstacle', 'obstruction', 'impediment', or 'error'. archive.org full-text search for 'tied himself to a post' and 'himself to a post to keep from'. Tolstoy's For Every Day (vol. 43) and The Path of Life (vol. 45).
4. Одно из самых вредных суеверий есть суеверие о том, что мир сотворен, что он произошел из ничего и что есть бог творящий.
В сущности мы не имеем никакого основания и никакой нужды предполагать бога-творца (китайцы и индейцы не знают этого понятия), а между тем бог творец и промыслитель несовместим с христианским богом отцом, богом духом, частица которого живет во мне, составляет мою жизнь и проявить и вызвать которую составляет смысл моей жизни, — богом любовью.
Бог творец равнодушен и допускает страдание и зло. Бог дух избавляет от страдания и зла и есть всегда совершенное благо.
Есть я, познающий мир данными мне орудиями чувств и знающий внутренно своего отца бога, но бога творца я не знаю и не могу знать.
4. One of the most harmful superstitions is the superstition that the world was created, that it came out of nothing, and that there is a God who creates.
In truth we have no ground at all and no need to suppose a Creator God (the Chinese and the Indians do not know this concept), and yet a God who is creator and provider is incompatible with the Christian God the Father, God the Spirit, a particle of whom lives in me and makes up my life, a particle that it is the meaning of my life to manifest and call forth — with God who is love.
God the Creator is indifferent and permits suffering and evil. God the Spirit delivers from suffering and evil and is always the perfect good.
I exist, coming to know the world through the instruments of the senses given to me, and knowing inwardly my Father, God; but God the Creator I do not know and cannot know.
Translation note. «Промыслитель»: God as the one whose providence orders and provides for the world; here “provider.”
Есть много хорошего и в Коране, и в буддийских, и в конфуцианских книгах, и в писаниях стоиков, и в Библии, и в Упанишадах, и в Евангелии, но больше всего нужного и понятного в ближайших нам религиозных мыслителях.
There is much that is good in the Koran, and in the Buddhist and the Confucian books, and in the writings of the Stoics, and in the Bible, and in the Upanishads, and in the Gospel; but it is in the religious thinkers nearest to us that most of what is needed and understandable is found.
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