Note 289 — 1898

In Paths of Life Tolstoi expresses this thought more exactly: “That which we consider for ourselves as evil, is in most cases a good which is not yet understood by us.” In another place he says in speaking of the same problem: “We must distinguish between our conceptions of evil in general, ‘objective’ evil, as philosophers say, an outer one, and between evil for each man individually, a ‘subjective’ evil, an inner one. There is no objective evil. Subjective evil is a departure from reason, it is indeed death.” (A combination, The Four Gospels Harmonized, Translated and Studied, Chapter III.) See also Journal of May 28, 1896, thought 1.