The Adolescent

“I dreamed a dream that was completely unexpected for me, because I had never had one like it. In Dresden, in the gallery, there’s a painting by Claude Lorrain—Acis and Galatea³² according to the catalog, but I’ve always called it The Golden Age, I don’t know why myself. I had seen it before, and then, some three days earlier, I had noticed it once again in passing. I saw this painting in my dream, but not as a painting, but as if it were something happening. However, I don’t know precisely what I dreamed; it was exactly as in the painting—a corner of the Greek archipelago, and time, too, seemed to have shifted back three thousand years; gentle blue waves, islands and rocks, a flowering coast, a magic panorama in the distance, the inviting, setting sun—words can’t express it. Here European mankind remembered its cradle, and the thought of it seemed to fill my soul with a kindred love. This was the earthly paradise of mankind: the gods came down from heaven and were united with people . . . Oh, beautiful people lived here! They woke up and fell asleep happy and innocent; the meadows and groves were filled with their songs and merry shouts; a great surplus of untouched forces went into love and simplehearted joy. The sun poured down warmth and light on them, rejoicing over its beautiful children . . . A wonderful reverie, a lofty delusion of mankind! The golden age—the most incredible dream of all that have ever been, but for which people have given all their lives and all their strength, for which prophets have died and been slain, without which the peoples do not want to live and cannot even die! And it was as if I lived through this whole feeling in my dream; the cliffs and the sea and the slanting rays of the setting sun—it was as if I could still see it all when I woke up and opened my eyes, literally wet with tears. I remember that I was glad. A feeling of happiness unknown to me before went through my heart, even to the point of pain; this was an all-human love. It was already full evening; a sheaf of slanting rays came in the window of my little room, breaking through the greenery of the plants on the windowsill, pouring its light over me. And then, my friend, and then—this setting sun of the first day of European mankind, which I had seen in my dream, turned for me as soon as I woke up, in reality, into the setting sun of the last day of European mankind! At that time especially it was as if a death knell could be heard over Europe. I’m not just speaking of the war, or of the Tuileries;

³³ I knew even without that that it would all pass away, the whole countenance of the old European world—sooner or later; but as a Russian European I couldn’t accept it. Yes, they had just burned the Tuileries then . . . Oh, don’t worry, I know it was ‘logical,’ and I understand only too well the irresistibility of the current idea, but as a bearer of the highest Russian cultural thought I couldn’t accept it, because the highest Russian thought is the all-reconciliation of ideas. And who in the whole world could understand such a thought then? I wandered alone. I’m not talking about myself personally—I’m talking about Russian thought. There, there was strife and logic; there the Frenchman was only a Frenchman, and the German only a German, and that with a greater intensity than at any time in their entire history; meaning that a Frenchman never did more harm to France, or a German to his Germany, than at that time! In the whole of Europe then there wasn’t a single European! I alone among all those pétroleurs³⁴

could tell them to their faces that their Tuileries was a mistake, and I alone among all the avenging conservatives could tell the avengers that the Tuileries, though a crime, still had its logic. And that was so, my boy, because I alone, as a Russian, was then the only European in Europe. I’m not talking about myself—I’m talking about all of Russian thought. I wandered, my friend, I wandered and knew firmly that I had to keep silent and wander. But still I felt sad. My boy, I cannot help respecting my nobility. It seems you’re laughing?”

“No, I’m not laughing,” I said in a deeply moved voice, “I’m not laughing at all. You’ve shaken my heart with your vision of the golden age, and be assured that I’m beginning to understand you. But most of all I’m glad that you respect yourself so much. I hasten to tell you so. That’s something I never expected of you!”

“I’ve already told you that I like your exclamations, my dear,” he smiled again at my naïve exclamation and, getting up from his armchair, began pacing the room without noticing it. I also got up. He went on speaking in his strange language, but with deeply penetrating thought.

III