Zosima makes some very good points in his speech before he dies. A valid point he makes is about how materialistic things complicate life and can make one unhappy. The less one has, the more they appreciate what has been given to them. If one has a lot, then they take what they have for granted. He refers to the term isolation a lot.
He talks about how man isolates himself from others and just worries about his possessions all the time. "...they distort their own nature, for they generate many meaningless and foolish desires, habits, and the most absurd fancies in themselves. They live only for mutual envy, for pleasure-seeking and self-display. (314)" People are too worried about what others think; too much time is spent trying to impress others. Instead of actually having relationships with people, all the time is spent bettering one's status.
Zosima also points out that people have obscured priorities. "To have dinners, horses, carriages, rank, and slaves to serve them is now considered such a necessity that for the sake of it, to satisfy it, they will sacrifice life, honor, the love of mankind, and will even kill themselves if they are unable to satisfy it (314)." Instead of loving one's neighbor and things like that, life becomes revolved around becoming higher ranked and proving oneself in society. Everything needed to get to heaven is basically thrown out and now people just care about getting rich with no regards to what is at stake.
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