There May Be Responsible Persons, But There

What, Then, Is That Incalculable Feeling That Deprives The Mind Of The Sleep Necessary To Life? A World That Can Be Explained Even With Bad Reasons Is A Familiar World. But, On The Other Hand, In A Universe Suddenly Divested Of Illusions And Lights, Man Feels An Alien, A Stranger. His Exile Is Without Remedy Since He Is Deprived Of The Memory Of A Lost Home Or The Hope Of A Promised Land. This Divorce Between Man And His Life, The Actor And His Setting, Is Properly The Feeling Of Absurdity.

Thus, I Always Began By Assuming The Worst; My Appeal Was Dismissed. That Meant, Of Course, I Was To Die. Sooner Than Others, Obviously. 'but,' I Reminded Myself, 'it's Common Knowledge That Life Isn't Worth Living, Anyhow.' And, On A Wide View, I Could See That It Makes Little Difference Whether One Dies At The Age Of Thirty Or Threescore And Ten-- Since, In Either Case, Other Men Will Continue Living, The World Will Go On As Before. Also, Whether I Died Now Or Forty Years Hence, This Business Of Dying Had To Be Got Through, Inevitably.

For If I Try To Seize This Self Of Which I Feel Sure, If I Try To Define And To Summarize It, It Is Nothing But Water Slipping Through My Fingers.

What Can A Meaning Outside My Condition Mean To Me? I Can Understand Only In Human Terms. What I Touch, What Resists Me - That I Understand. And These Two Certainties - My Appetite For The Absolute And For Unity And The Impossibility Of Reducing This World To A Rational And Reasonable Principle - I Also Know That I Cannot Reconcile Them. What Other Truth Can I Admit Without Lying, Without Bringing In A Hope I Lack And Which Means Nothing Within The Limits Of My Conditions?

The Reasoning Is Classic In Its Clarity. If God Does Not Exist, Kirilov Is God. If God Does Not Exist, Kirilov Must Kill Himself. Kirilov Must Therefore Kill Himself To Become God. That Logic Is Absurd, But It Is What Is Needed.