The poetic beauty of Davy's mind never seems to have left him. To that circumstance I would ascribe the distinguishing feature in his character, and in his discoveries,-a vivid imagination sketching out new tracts in regions unexplored, for the judgement to select those leading to the recesses of abstract truth.
In exploring new and doubtful tracts of speculation, the mind strikes out true and original views; as a drop of water hesitates at first what direction it will take, but afterwards follows its own course.
Every life has dark tracts and long stretches of somber tint, and no representation is true to fact which dips its pencil only in light, and flings no shadows on the canvas.
I don't write tracts, I write novels. I'm not a preacher, I'm a fiction writer.
Dostoevsky wrote fiction about identity, moral value, death, will, sexual vs. spiritual love, greed, freedom, obsession, reason, faith, suicide. And he did it without ever reducing his characters to mouthpieces or his books to tracts. His concern was always what it is to be a human being—that is, how to be an actual *person*, someone whose life is informed by values and principles, instead of just an especially shrewd kind of self-preserving animal.
What I do not want to write is didactic political tracts.
We have endless books about whether Jesus existed, or whether the Jesus we have learned about is really accurate and historical or mythical. We have endless complicated tracts on fine technical issues, but we don't explore Jesus' way to happiness and peace, or try to understand his feelings about God and creation of how he views our relationship with God, or his attitude toward human weakness. Understanding these things could help us immensely in our own search for inner peace and a meaning to life.
