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or if, being a Christian, from weakness he enters into marital relations
with the ceremonies of the church, or without them, he has no other
alternative than to abide with his wife (and the wife with her husband,
if it is she who is a Christian) and to aspire together with her to free
themselves of their sin. This is the Christian view of marriage; and
there cannot be any other for a man who honestly endeavors to shape his
life in accordance with the teachings of Christ.
To very many persons the thoughts I have uttered here and in "The
Kreutzer Sonata" will seem strange, vague, even contradictory. They
certainly do contradict, not each other, but the whole tenor of our
lives, and involuntarily a doubt arises, "on which side is truth,--on
the side of the thoughts which seem true and well-founded, or on the
side of the lives of others and myself?" I, too, was weighed down
by that same doubt when writing "The Kreutzer Sonata." I had not the
faintest presentiment that the train of thought I had started would lead
me whither it did. I was terrified by my own conclusion, and I was at
first disposed to reject it, but it was impossible not to hearken to the
voice of my reason and my conscience. And so, strange though they may
appear to many, opposed as they undoubtedly are to the trend and tenor
of our lives, and incompatible though they may prove with what I have
heretofore thought and uttered, I have no choice but to accept them.
"But man is weak," people will object. "His task should be regulated by
his strength."
This is tantamount to saying, "My hand is weak. I cannot draw a straight
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