What does the last sentence in chapter 2 of Crime and Punishment really mean? The sentence I'm referring to is this one. > ‘And what if I am wrong,’ he cried suddenly after a moment’s thought. ‘What if man is not really a scoundrel, man in general, I mean, the whole race of mankind—then all the rest is prejudice, simply artificial terrors and there are no barriers and it’s all as it should be.’ It's the very last sentence of the second chapter. I have read a German version but that doesn't really matter. The translation is very similar. I don't fully understand what this sentence really means. Can someone explain it? This seems to be an important sentence since we don't get to hear much from Raskolnikov in this chapter besides this sentence. Or maybe the question is: What does Raskolnikov mean with this sentence?

When Rodion says he could be wrong, he means his words for the previous sentence:

> Hurrah for Sonia! What a mine they've dug there! And they're making the most of it! Yes, they are making the most of it! They've wept over it and grown used to it. Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel!

So he says that man must be a scoundrel to accept the fact that their own daughter works as a prostitute in order to support the family.

And if _that_ doesn't mean that man is the scoundrel, if _that_ is acceptable in the world of man, then there is no morality at all, and all the notions of good and bad are just superstitions produced by fear. And there are no barriers.

That's how I understand this passage.