Demons

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

‘Listen, Stavrogin: to level mountains is a good idea, and isn’t ridiculous. I’m for Shigalyov! There’s no need for education, enough of science! Even without science there’s enough material for a thousand years, but obedience has to be established. There’s only one thing lacking in the world: obedience. The thirst for education is nothing but an aristocratic thirst. No sooner do we have the family or love than the desire for private property arises. We will kill desire: we will foster drunkenness, gossip, denunciation; we will foster unheard-of depravity; we will stifle every genius in its infancy. Everything reduced to a common denominator, complete equality. “We have learned a trade, and we are honest people, we need nothing else” —that’s the answer given recently by the English workers. Only what’s essential is essential — that’s the motto of the planet from now on. But a shaking up is necessary too: we, the rulers, will take care of that. The slaves ought to have rulers. Complete obedience, a complete lack of individuality, but once every thirty years along comes Shigalyov to shake things up and everyone suddenly begins to devour each other, up to a certain point, only to avoid boredom. Boredom is an aristocratic feeling; in Shigalyovism there will be no desires. Desire and suffering will be for us, and for the slaves — Shigalyovism.’