Fathers and Sons

by Ivan Turgenev

Formerly young men had to study. If they didn’t want to be called fools they had to work hard whether they liked it or not. But now they need only say ‘Everything in the world is rubbish!’ and the trick is done. Young men are delighted. And, to be sure, they were only sheep before, but now they have suddenly turned into Nihilists.”

Then Arina Vlasyevna came up to him and leaning her grey head against his grey head, she said: “What can we do, Vasya? A son is a piece broken off. He’s like a falcon that flies home and flies away again when it wants; but you and I are like mushrooms growing in the hollow of a tree, we sit side by side without moving from the same place. Only I will never change for you, and you will always be the same for me.” Vassily Ivanovich took his hands from his face and embraced his wife, his friend, more warmly than he had ever embraced her in his youth; she comforted him in his sorrow.

Here, surrounded by shade and coolness, she used to read and work, or give herself up to that sensation of perfect peace, known probably to everyone, the charm of which consists in the half-conscious mute listening to that vast current of life which uninterruptedly flows both around us and within us.

“Yes,” repeated Katya, and this time he understood her. He seized her large beautiful hands and, breathless with enthusiasm, he pressed them to his heart. He could hardly stand on his feet, and only kept on repeating, “Katya, Katya... ” and she began to weep in such an innocent way, smiling gently at her own tears. Whoever has not seen such tears in the eyes of a beloved person has not yet experienced to what an extent, overwhelmed with gratitude and awe, a human being may find happiness on earth.

Death is an old joke, but it comes like new to everyone.

Can it be that their prayers and their tears are fruitless? Can it be that love, sacred devoted love, is not all powerful? Oh, no! However passionate, sinful or rebellious the heart hidden in the tomb, the flowers growing over it peep at us serenely with their innocent eyes; they tell us not only of eternal peace, of that great peace of “indifferent” nature; they tell us also of eternal reconciliation and of life without end.