When the Grand Inquisitor stops speaking, he waits a little for the prisoner to answer him. He finds His silence disconcerting. He has seen the captive listening all the while quietly and attentively, looking him straight in the eye, and apparently not wishing to respond. The old man wants Him to say something, no matter how unpleasant and terrible. But He suddenly approaches the old man in silence and calmly kisses him on his bloodless ninety-years-old lips. That is His only response. The old man shudders. His lips quiver; he goes to the door of the cell, opens it, and says: “Go and don’t come back any more … never … never … never, never!” And he releases Him into the dark backstreets of Seville. The prisoner walks away.

From Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Karamazov Brothers, translated by Ignat Avsey, New York: Oxford University Press, 1998 (first published in 1994), p. 329.