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Sienkiewicz, Henryk, 1846-1916

"Without Dogma"

"I hear thy voice, but I see thee not." My spiritual
sight suffers from Daltonian disease and cannot distinguish colors.
I cannot even understand how any one can accept a principle, however
hallowed by ages, without looking at it from both sides, pulling it to
pieces, into shreds and atoms, until it crumbles into dust and cannot
be put together any more.
Aniela cannot understand that a principle once considered good,
hallowed by religion, as well as by public opinion, could be
considered otherwise than as a sacred duty.
It does not matter to me whether she is conscious of it, or it is
instinctive impulse reasoned out by her intelligence, or merely
acquired; it is enough that it has entered her very nature.
I had a glimpse of it the other day when I spoke about Pani Korytzka's
divorce suit: "You can prove everything, and yet when one does wrong
conscience tells us: 'It is wrong, it is wrong!'" I did not then
attach the importance to these words that belonged to them. In Aniela
there is no wavering, no doubt whatever. Her soul winnows the chaff
from the grain with such precision that there can be no question about
its purity. She does not try to find her own norma, but takes it
ready-made from religion, general moral principles, and clings to
them so strongly that they become her very own, for they permeate her
system.


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