War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [764]
As everything in a dream is false, senseless, and contradictory, except for the feeling that guides the dream, so in this sort of communication, contrary to all the laws of reason, it was not the words that were consistent and clear, but only the feeling that guided them.
Natasha told Pierre about her brother’s daily life, about how she suffered and did not live without her husband, and about how she had come to love Marie still more, and how Marie was better than her in all respects. In saying that, Natasha was sincerely acknowledging that she saw Marie’s superiority, but, while saying it, she demanded that Pierre still prefer her to Marie and to all other women, and now, especially after having seen so many women in Petersburg, that he repeat it to her again.
Pierre, in reply to Natasha’s words, told her how unbearable it was for him to be at soirées and dinners with ladies in Petersburg.
“I’ve completely forgotten how to talk with ladies,” he said, “it was simply boring. Especially since I was so busy.”
Natasha looked at him intently and went on:
“Marie is so lovely!” she said. “How well she understands children. It’s as if she sees only their souls. Yesterday, for instance, Mitenka began to fuss…”
“Ah, he’s so much like his father,” Pierre interrupted.
Natasha understood why he made this observation about Mitenka’s resemblance to Nikolai: he had an unpleasant memory of the argument with his brother-in-law and wanted to know Natasha’s opinion about it.
“Nikolenka has this weakness, that if something isn’t generally accepted by everybody, he won’t agree with it for anything. But I understand that you precisely value what can ouvrir une carrière,”*755 she said, repeating words that Pierre had said once.
“No, the main thing is,” said Pierre, “that for Nikolai thoughts and arguments are an amusement, almost a pastime. Here he’s collecting a library and has made it a rule not to buy a new book before he’s read what he’s bought—Sismondi, and Rousseau, and Montesquieu,” Pierre added with a smile. “You know how he and I…” He was beginning to soften his words, but Natasha interrupted him, letting him feel that it was unnecessary.
“So you say thinking is an amusement for him…”
“Yes, and for me all the rest is an amusement. All the while I was in Petersburg, I saw everyone as if in a dream. When I’m taken up with a thought, all the rest is an amusement.”
“Ah, what a pity I didn’t see you greet the children,” said Natasha. “Which of them was most glad? Liza, surely?”
“Yes,” said Pierre, and he went on with what occupied him. “Nikolai says we shouldn’t think. But I can’t help it. Not to speak of the fact that in Petersburg I felt (I can tell you) that without me it would all fall apart, each one pulling in his own direction. But I succeeded in uniting them all, and besides, my thought is so simple and clear. I don’t say we should oppose this or that. We may be mistaken. What I say is: let’s join hands with those who love the good, and let there be one banner—active virtue. Prince Sergei is a nice man and intelligent.”
Natasha would have had no doubt that Pierre’s thought was a great thought, but one thing confused her. It was the fact that he was her husband. “Can it be that a man so important and necessary for society is at the same time my husband? How did it happen that way?” She wanted to express this doubt to him. “Who and what are the people who could decide whether he is really so much smarter than everyone else?” she asked herself, and went over in her imagination the people whom Pierre