Mark[_2_]
December 25th 07, 10:44 PM
me? thought Winston, with a momentary
bitterness. O'Brien checked his step as though Winston had uttered the
thought aloud. His large ugly face came nearer, with the eyes a little
narrowed.
'You are thinking,' he said, 'that since we intend to destroy you
utterly, so that nothing that you say or do can make the smallest
difference -- in that case, why do we go to the trouble of interrogating
you first? That is what you were thinking, was it not?'
'Yes,' said Winston.
O'Brien smiled slightly. 'You are a flaw in the pattern, Winston. You
are a stain that must be wiped out. Did I not tell you just now that we are
different from the persecutors of the past? We are not content with
negative obedience, nor even with the most abject submission. When finally
you surrender to us, it must be of your own free will. We do not destroy
the heretic because he resists us: so long as he resists us we never
destroy him. We convert him, we capture his inner mind, we reshape him. We
burn all evil and all illusion out of him; we bring him over to our side,
not in appearance, but genuinely, heart and soul. We make him one of
ourselves before we kill him. It is intolerable to us that a
bitterness. O'Brien checked his step as though Winston had uttered the
thought aloud. His large ugly face came nearer, with the eyes a little
narrowed.
'You are thinking,' he said, 'that since we intend to destroy you
utterly, so that nothing that you say or do can make the smallest
difference -- in that case, why do we go to the trouble of interrogating
you first? That is what you were thinking, was it not?'
'Yes,' said Winston.
O'Brien smiled slightly. 'You are a flaw in the pattern, Winston. You
are a stain that must be wiped out. Did I not tell you just now that we are
different from the persecutors of the past? We are not content with
negative obedience, nor even with the most abject submission. When finally
you surrender to us, it must be of your own free will. We do not destroy
the heretic because he resists us: so long as he resists us we never
destroy him. We convert him, we capture his inner mind, we reshape him. We
burn all evil and all illusion out of him; we bring him over to our side,
not in appearance, but genuinely, heart and soul. We make him one of
ourselves before we kill him. It is intolerable to us that a