Demons

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

There’s nothing more powerful than a uniform. I make a point of dreaming up ranks and offices: I have secretaries, secret agents, treasurers, chairmen, registrars, their colleagues — it’s a lot of fun and it has really caught on. After that, the second most powerful force is, of course, sentimentality. You know, socialism in Russia is spreading primarily out of sentimentality. But the trouble is all these second lieutenants who go around biting people; every once in a while you run across them. Then come the out-and-out crooks. Well, maybe they’re a good bunch of people, sometimes very useful, but a lot of time is spent on them, they require constant watching. Well then, finally there’s the most important force, the cement that binds everything: the shame of their own opinion. Now there’s a force for you! And who was it that worked so hard, who was this “sweetie-pie” 24 who toiled away so diligently that no one else has a single idea of his own left in his head! They would consider that shameful.’