# I explained — A Confession > Chapter companion for A Confession by Leo Tolstoy. ## What happens The narrator describes his upbringing in the Orthodox Christian faith and his gradual loss of belief, beginning in childhood and crystallizing by age eighteen. He recounts how religious doctrine was merely an external formality among his social circle, easily discarded under the influence of knowledge and experience. He reflects on the story of S., whose faith evaporated after a single comment from his brother, and confesses that his own youthful faith was replaced by a belief in self-perfection, which eventually devolved into a desire for fame, wealth, and power over others. ## Themes in this chapter ### Faith and Doubt The narrator's loss of childhood faith and the gradual erosion of religious belief under the influence of reason and experience. ### The Search for Life's Meaning The narrator's early belief in self-perfection as a substitute for religious faith, and its eventual corruption into worldly ambition. ### Vanity of Worldly Success The narrator's pursuit of perfection devolves into a desire for fame, wealth, and power over others. ## Character check-ins ### Narrator Reflects on his childhood faith, its loss, and his subsequent belief in self-perfection. ### Dmitriy The narrator's elder brother who devoted himself to religion and was ridiculed by the family. ### Leo Tolstoy Implied as the authorial voice behind the narrator's experiences and reflections. ## Key lines > I was baptized and brought up in the Orthodox Christian faith. I was taught it in childhood and throughout my boyhood and youth. But when I abandoned the second course of the university at the age of eighteen I no longer believed any of the things I had been taught. Though raised in the Orthodox faith, by the time I left university at eighteen, I had stopped believing in what I was taught. _The narrator states his early loss of faith._ > My lapse from faith occurred as is usual among people on our level of education. In most cases, I think, it happens thus: a man lives like everybody else, on the basis of principles not merely having nothing in common with religious doctrine, but generally opposed to it; religious doctrine does not play a part in life, in intercourse with others it is never encountered, and in a man's own life he never has to reckon with it. My loss of faith was typical for educated people: we live by principles that contradict religion, and faith never actually matters in daily life or relationships. _The narrator generalizes his experience as common among his social class._ > I believed in a God, or rather I did not deny God—but I could not have said what sort of God. Neither did I deny Christ and his teaching, but what his teaching consisted in I again could not have said. I had a vague belief in God and Christ, but could not define either. _The narrator describes his uncertain, undefined faith after abandoning orthodoxy._ > My faith—my only real faith—that which apart from my animal instincts gave impulse to my life—was a belief in perfecting myself. The only genuine faith I had was in self-improvement. _The narrator identifies his true belief as a drive for personal perfection._ > And very soon this effort again changed into a desire to be stronger than others: to be more famous, more important and richer than others. Soon my pursuit of perfection turned into a desire for fame, importance, and wealth. _The narrator notes how his ideal of self-perfection corrupted into worldly ambition._ ## Links - HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/a_confession_se/chapters/i - Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/a_confession_se - All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/a_confession_se/chapters