Fortuitous Poem by Isaiah Berlin on Alexander Herzen

He believed that the ultimate goal of life was life itself;
That the day and the hour were ends in themselves,
Not a means to another day or another experience.
He believed that remote ends were a dream,
That faith in them was a fatal illusion;
That to sacrifice the present,
Or the immediate and foreseeable future
To these distant ends
Must always lead to cruel and futile forms
Of human sacrifice.

He believed that values were not found in an impersonal, objective realm
But were created by human beings
Changed with the generation of men
But were nonetheless binding
Upon those who lived in their light;
That suffering was inescapable
And infallible knowledge neither attainable nor needed.

He believed in reason, scientific methods, individual action, empirically discovered truths;
But he tended to suspect that faith in general formulae, laws, prescriptions in human affairs
Was an attempt, sometimes catastrophic, always irrational,
To escape from the uncertainty and unpredictable variety of life
To the false security of our symmetrical fantasies.

He was fully conscious of what he believed.