Anna Karenina - LimpidSoft

PART FOUR CHAPTER 13
Chapter 13
WHEN they rose from table, Levin would have liked to follow Kitty into the drawing
room; but he was afraid she might dislike this, as too obviously paying her
attention. He remained in the little ring of men, taking part in the general conversation,
and without looking at Kitty, he was aware of her movements, her looks, and
the place where she was in the drawing room.
He did at once, and without the smallest effort, keep the promise he had made her–
always to think well of all men, and to like everyone always. The conversation fell on
the village commune, in which Pestsov saw a sort of special principle, called by him
the choral principle. Levin did not agree with Pestsov, nor with his brother, who had
a special attitude of his own, both admitting and not admitting the significance of
the Russian commune. But he talked to them, simply trying to reconcile and soften
their differences. He was not in the least interested in what he said himself, and even
less so in what they said; all he wanted was that they and everyone should be happy
and contented. He knew now the one thing of importance; and that one thing was
at first there, in the drawing room, and then began moving across and came to a
standstill at the door. Without turning round he felt the eyes fixed on him, and the
smile, and he could not help turning round. She was standing in the doorway with
Shtcherbatsky, looking at him.
“I thought you were going towards the piano,” said he, going up to her. “That’s
something I miss in the country–music.”
“No; we only came to fetch you and thank you,” she said, rewarding him with a
smile that was like a gift, “for coming. What do they want to argue for? No one ever
convinces anyone, you know.”
“Yes; that’s true,” said Levin; “it generally happens that one argues warmly simply
because one can’t make out what one’s opponent wants to prove.”
Levin had often noticed in discussions between the most intelligent people that after
enormous efforts, and an enormous expenditure of logical subtleties and words,
the disputants finally arrived at being aware that what they had so long been struggling
to prove to one another had long ago, from the beginning of the argument,
been known to both, but that they liked different things, and would not define what
they liked for fear of its being attacked. He had often had the experience of suddenly
in a discussion grasping what it was his opponent liked and at once liking it
too, and immediately he found himself agreeing, and then all arguments fell away as
useless. Sometimes, too, he had experienced the opposite, expressing at last what he
liked himself, which he was devising arguments to defend, and, chancing to express
it well and genuinely, he had found his opponent at once agreeing and ceasing to
dispute his position. He tried to say this.
She knitted her brow, trying to understand. But directly he began to illustrate his
meaning, she understood at once.
“I know: one must find out what he is arguing for, what is precious to him, then
one can...”
She had completely guessed and expressed his badly expressed idea. Levin smiled
joyfully; he was struck by this transition from the confused, verbose discussion with
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