There is no doubt that Dostoievsky meant to pass a stern judgment when he made the “harmless” old liberal the father of Pyotr Stepanovich and the former tutor of Stavrogin. The devils that were loosed on the community were incubated in that muddled, innocent brain, which when put the question cannot even say unequivocally whether or not it believes in God: “I can’t understand why they make me out an infidel here. I believe in God, mais distinguons. I believe in Him as a Being who is conscious of Himself in me only. ... As for Christianity, for all my genuine respect for it...I am more of an antique pagan, like the great Goethe. ...” Liberalism is the father of nihilism; it is only a step to Kirillov and his ruling idea of the man-god, and Kirillov at least has the manhood— or god-hood—to act on his crazed conviction.
The town was “ready” for Pyotr Stepanovich and his quintet, which was only the inner circle of activists. There was a less clearly defined outer circle—possibly there were several concentric ones—of adherents to a secret organization referred to as “the Society.” And a proof of the town’s “readiness” to catch fire was that there were people in it who did not know whether they were members or not. Long after the scare had died down, an elderly Councillor, wearing the decoration of the Stanislas Order, came forward and confessed that for three months he had been under the influence of the Internationale; unable to produce evidence for the claim, he insisted that “he had felt it in all his feelings.” Earlier, at the height of the strange affair, the quaking Stepan Trofimovich, who has undergone a police search of his rooms, is queried suddenly by the narrator: “ ‘Stepan Trofimovich, tell me as a friend...do you belong to some secret society or not?’ ...‘That depends, voyez-vous.’ ‘How do you mean “it depends”?’ ‘When with one’s whole heart one is an adherent of progress and...who can answer it? You may suppose that you don’t belong, and suddenly it turns out that you do....’ ” In his uncertainty, which fear and pompous vanity make a half-certainty, he is convinced that he is going to be taken “in a cart” to Siberia. The chosen few of the nihilist inner circle are, on the whole, uncompromising in their positions, but those who are outside and somewhat envious (i.e., virtually the entire educated population) behave vis-à-vis the terrorists with the wildest inconsistency. Stepan Trofimovich professes to abhor his son’s activities—and maybe he does—yet the narrator learns that on his premises the police have found two manifestoes. “Manifestoes!” cries the narrator. “Do you mean to say you...” “Oh, ten were left here,” the old man answers with vexation.