John T. Noonan Jr. the reflections of Prince Myshkin, is "the most important, perhaps the sole law of human existence." Feodor Dostoevsky, "The Idiot", 292 (Alan Myers, trans.) (1991). In the vernacular, compassion is trumps. No one can read the accounts of the sufferings of the deceased plaintiffs supplied by their declarations, or the accounts of the sufferings of their patients supplied by the physicians, without being moved by them. No one would inflict such sufferings on another or want them inflicted on himself; and since the horrors recounted are those that could attend the end of life anyone who reads of them must
Alyosha Karamazov moral agent, playing a passive role in the events of the novel. Rufus W. Mathewson states that Alyosha Karamazov is a more robust positive hero than Prince Myshkin. He argues that Alyosha is closer than Myshkin to being an active spokesman for conservatism, citing Alyosha's most impressive success as helping Dmitri. He describes Alyosha as relying on forgiveness, kindness and natural justice, rather than attempting to change the social order. Alyosha is named after Dostoevsky's son of the same name, who was born in 1875 but died in 1878 of epilepsy. Because of this Dostoevsky imbued Alyosha with qualities and