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to his belief, life ought to pass — easily, gaily, becomingly. He rose at nine, drank his coffee, read his "Gazette," put on his demi-uniform, and went to Court. Here was piled up the harness in which he worked, and he readily adjusted himself to it. Petitioners, interrogatories in Court, the Court itself, sessions — public and administrative. In dealing with all this business, one had to know how to exclude everything crude — everything relating to life in the concrete — things which always impede the regular course of official affairs. It was necessary to guard against entering into anything but strictly official relations with people, and official relations had to be the one occasion for any dealings with them at all, and the relations themselves could be only official. For instance, a man might come and desire to be informed about something. Ivan Il'ich could have no relations with such an individual except in his official capacity; but if his relations with this man were official, and the terms of them were such as could be expressed on headed official paper, then within the limits of such official relations Ivan Il'ich would do all in his power for the man, and do it most emphatically, and at the same time observe the form of humane and friendly intercourse in the shape of politeness. Every cessation of intercourse carried with it the cessation of every other sort of intercourse. The capacity of isolating the official side of his character, so that it never interfered with his real life, was possessed by Ivan Il'ich in the highest degree, and long practice, combined with talent, enabled him to carry it out to such a degree that sometimes he even