WHAT MEN LIVE BY
Leo Tolstoy
Adapted and Abridged by Blogger
NO ONE SEWED boots so neatly and strongly as Simon’s workman, Michael; and from all the district round people came to Simon for their boots.Leo Tolstoy
Adapted and Abridged by Blogger
One winter day a fine carriage drove up to the hut. A gentleman in a fur coat got out and walked up to Simon’s hut.
Up jumped Matryona, Simon's wife, and opened the door. The gentleman stooped to enter the hut, and when he drew himself up again his head nearly reached the ceiling.
Simon bowed and looked at the gentleman with astonishment. Simon himself was lean, Michael was thin, and Matryona was dry as a bone, but this man was like from another world, looking like he were cast in iron.
The gentleman threw off his fur coat, sat down on the bench, and said, “Which of you is the master bootmaker?”
“I am, your Excellency,” said Simon.
Then the gentleman shouted to his servant, “Fedka, bring the leather!”
The servant ran in, bringing a parcel.
“Untie it,” said the gentleman and pointed to the exposed leather.
“Do you know the kind of leather this is, Shoemaker?"
Simon felt the leather and said, “It is good leather.”
“Good, indeed! It’s German, and cost twenty roubles. Now, can you make it into boots for me?”
“Yes, your Excellency, I can.”
The gentleman shouted at him:
“Remember whom you are to make them for, and what the leather is. You must make me boots that will wear for a year. Otherwise I will have you put in prison. If they don’t burst or lose shape for a year I will pay ten roubles.”
Calling his servant, the gentleman told him to pull the boot off his left leg, which he stretched out.
“Measure my feet!” he commanded Simon. Meanwhile he had noticed Michael.
“Who's he?”
“That's my workman. He will sew the boots.”
“Mind,” said the gentleman to Michael, “remember to make them so they will last a year.”
Simon saw that Michael was gazing into the corner behind the gentleman, as if he saw someone. Then he smiled, and his face brightened.
“What are you grinning at, you fool?” thundered the gentleman. “You had better look to it that the boots are ready in time.”
When the gentleman left, Simon said: “What a man! You couldn't kill him with a mallet.”
His wife agreed: “Living as he does, how should he not grow strong? Death itself can’t touch a rock like that.”
Michael sewed till noon. Then Simon rose for dinner, looked around, and saw that Michael had made slippers out of the gentleman’s leather.
And he said to Michael, “What have you done? You've ruined me! You know the gentleman ordered high boots, but see what you have made!”
Hardly had he begun to rebuke Michael, when there was a knock at the door. They opened it, and the servant who had been with the gentleman came in.
"Good day,” said Simon. “Can I help you?”
“My mistress has sent me about the boots.”
Simon trembled.
“What about the boots?”
“My master no longer needs them. He is dead.”
Michael handed the slippers to the servant, who left.
Michael was now living his sixth year with Simon. They were all home one day.
Matryona put iron pots in the oven as the children ran along the benches and looked out the window. Simon sewed at one window, and Michael fastened a heel at the other.
“Look, Uncle Michael!" one child said. "There is a lady with little girls! She seems to be coming here. And one of the girls is lame.”
Michael looked out into the street. He never used to look out into the street, but now he pressed against the window, staring at something.
Simon saw a well-dressed woman enter his hut, leading by the hand two little girls in fur coats and woolen shawls. The girls looked alike except one was crippled in her left leg and walked with a limp.
“Come in,” said Simon. “What can we do for you?”
“I want leather shoes made for these two little girls for spring.”
“We never have made such small shoes, but we can make them. My man, Michael, is a master at the work.”
Simon glanced at Michael and saw him sitting with his eyes fixed on the girls. Simon could not understand why Michael should look at them like that—as if he had known them before.
He was puzzled, but went on talking with the woman, arranging the price. The woman lifted the lame girl on to her lap and said: “Take two measures from this little girl. Make one shoe for the lame foot and three for the sound one. They both have the same size feet. They are twins.”
Matryona wondered who this woman was, and whose the children were, so she asked: “Are not you their mother?”
“I am neither their mother nor related to them. They were orphans, so I adopted them.”
She pressed the lame little girl to her with one hand, while with the other she wiped the tears from her cheeks.
And Matryona sighed, and said: “The proverb is true: ‘One may live without parents, but one cannot live without God.’”
So they talked together, when suddenly the whole hut lit up from the corner where Michael sat. They looked towards him and saw him sitting, his hands folded on his knees, gazing upwards and smiling.
The woman left with the girls. Michael rose from the bench, put down his work, and took off his apron. Then, bowing low to Simon and his wife, he said: “Goodbye. God has forgiven me. I ask your forgiveness, too, for any mistake.”
And they saw that a light shone from Michael. And Simon rose, bowed down to Michael, and said: “I see, Michael, you are no common man. I can neither keep you nor question you. But tell me this: how is it that when I found you and brought you home, you were gloomy, and when my wife gave you food you smiled at her and became brighter? Then when the gentleman came to order the boots, you smiled again and became brighter still? And now, when this woman brought the little girls, you smiled a third time, and have become as bright as day?”
And Michael answered: “Light shines from me because I have been punished. Now God has pardoned me. And I smiled three times, because God sent me to learn three truths, and I have learnt them. One I learnt when your wife pitied me, and that is why I smiled the first time. The second I learnt when the rich man ordered the boots, and then I smiled again. And now, when I saw those little girls, I learned the third and last truth, and I smiled the third time.”
Simon said, “Tell me, Michael, what did God punish you for? and what were the three truths? that I, too, may know them.”
Michael answered: “I was an angel in heaven and disobeyed God. God sent me to fetch a woman’s soul. I flew to earth, and saw a sick woman lying alone, who had just given birth to twin girls. When she saw me, she understood that God had sent me for her soul, and she wept and said: ‘Angel of God! My husband has just been buried, killed by a falling tree. Do not take my soul! Let me nurse my babes, feed them, and set them on their feet before I die. Children cannot live without father or mother.’ I obeyed her and returned to the Lord in heaven.
"And God said: ‘Go. Take the mother’s soul, and learn three truths: Learn What dwells in man, What is not given to man, and What men live by. When you have learned these things, you can return to heaven.’
So I flew again to earth and took the mother’s soul. The babes dropped from her breasts. Her body rolled over on the bed and crushed one babe, twisting its leg. I rose above the village, wishing to take her soul to God; but a wind seized me, and my wings drooped and dropped off. Her soul rose alone to God, while I fell to earth by the roadside.”
And Simon and Matryona understood who it was that had lived with them, and whom they had clothed and fed. And they wept with awe and with joy.
The angel said: “I was alone in the field, naked. I was starved, frozen, and did not know what to do. Then I saw you. I saw death in your face. But you became alive, and I saw the presence of God. Your wife was even more terrible. The spirit of death came from her mouth. But you spoke to her of God, and when she brought me food and looked at me, I saw that death no longer dwelt in her; she had become alive, and in her, too, I saw God.
“Then I remembered the first lesson God had set me: ‘Learn what dwells in man.’ And I understood that in man dwells Love!
"I was glad God had already begun to show me what He had promised, and I smiled for the first time. But I did not yet know What is not given to man, and What men live by.
“I lived with you for a year. A man came to order boots that should last a year. I looked at him, and suddenly, behind his shoulder, I saw my comrade—the angel of death. None but me saw that angel; but I knew him, and knew that before the sun set he would take that rich man’s soul. And I thought to myself, ‘The man is making preparations for a year, and does not know he will die before evening.’ And I remembered God’s second saying, ‘Learn what is not given to man.’
“What dwells in man I already knew. Now I learnt what is not given him. It is not given to man to know his own needs. And I smiled for the second time.
“But I still did not know What men live by. And I waited till God should reveal the last lesson. In the sixth year came the twins with the woman; and I recognized them, and heard how they had been kept alive. I thought, ‘Their mother begged me for the children’s sake, and I believed her when she said that children cannot live without father or mother; but a stranger has nursed them, and has brought them up.’ And when the woman showed her love for the children that were not her own, and wept over them, I saw in her the living God and understood What men live by. And I knew that God had revealed to me the last lesson, and had forgiven my sin. And then I smiled for the third time.”
And the angel’s body was clothed in light so that eye could not look on him; and his voice grew louder, as though it came not from him but from heaven above. And the angel said:
“I have learnt that all men live not by care for themselves but by love.
“It was not given to the mother to know what her children needed for their life. Nor was it given to the rich man to know what he needed. Nor is it given to any man to know whether, when evening comes, he will need boots for his body or slippers for his corpse.
“I have now understood that though it seems to men that they live by care for themselves, in truth it is love alone by which they live. He who has love, is in God, and God is in him, for God is love.”
And the angel sang praise to God, so that the hut trembled at his voice. The roof opened, and a column of fire rose from earth to heaven. Simon and his wife and children fell to the ground. Wings appeared upon the angel’s shoulders, and he rose into the heavens.
And when Simon came to himself the hut stood as before, and there was no one in it but his own family.
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