eve neither in the immortality of your soul nor even the things you wrote about the Church and the ecclesiastical question.""You may well be correct ... Though actually I spoke not entirely in jest, either ..." Ivan Fyodorovich suddenly confessed in a strange manner, at the same time rapidly blushing."Truly said-you spoke not entirely in jest. That idea has not been resolved within your heart and is tormenting it. But even a martyr sometimes likes to keep himself amusedwith his despair, out of sheer despair, as it were. For the moment this is what you are doing:amusing yourself with your despair-in articles for journals and in worldly disputations, yourselfnot believing in your own dialectics and with pain in your heart smiling sceptically at them to yourself ... This question has not been resolved within you, and therein lies your great unhappiness, for it insistently demands resolution ...""But can it be resolved in me? Resolved in a positive direction?" Ivan Fyodorovich inquired, strangely, still looking at the Elder with a vague, inexplicable smile. (76-77)In this prophetic scene lies another of the keys to understanding our sympathy for Ivan: somewhat unlike Ratikin and Fyodor, the elder Karamazov, he is tormented because he feels that he should believe in God, but is unable to do so because he cannot dovetail thenecessary faith with his prideful rationalism. The others mentioned above feel somewhatsimilar emotions, but we as readers get the impression that they, if given the choice,would choose to give up guilt and lead entirely amoral lives if they could do so, whereasIvan, it seems, is paradoxically happier tormenting himself for his inability towholeheartedly follow God like Elder Zosima and Alyosha do. Ivan would prefer to createhis own devils rather than completely accept his atheistic, amoral ideas-hesubconsciously wants to believe in God but, because of his cold rationality, is unable to doso.This then, is an important fact...
