BOOK SIX: 1808 - 10
3. CHAPTER III
(continued)
"No, life is not over at thirty-one!" Prince Andrew suddenly decided
finally and decisively. "It is not enough for me to know what I have
in me- everyone must know it: Pierre, and that young girl who wanted
to fly away into the sky, everyone must know me, so that my life may
not be lived for myself alone while others live so apart from it,
but so that it may be reflected in them all, and they and I may live
in harmony!"
On reaching home Prince Andrew decided to go to Petersburg that
autumn and found all sorts of reasons for this decision. A whole
serics of sensible and logical considerations showing it to be
essential for him to go to Petersburg, and even to re-enter the
service, kept springing up in his mind. He could not now understand
how he could ever even have doubted the necessity of taking an
active share in life, just as a month before he had not understood how
the idea of leaving the quiet country could ever enter his head. It
now seemed clear to him that all his experience of life must be
senselessly wasted unless he applied it to some kind of work and again
played an active part in life. He did not even remember how
formerly, on the strength of similar wretched logical arguments, it
had seemed obvious that he would be degrading himself if he now, after
the lessons he had had in life, allowed himself to believe in the
possibility of being useful and in the possibility of happiness or
love. Now reason suggested quite the opposite. After that journey to
Ryazan he found the country dull; his former pursuits no longer
interested him, and often when sitting alone in his study he got up,
went to the mirror, and gazed a long time at his own face. Then he
would turn away to the portrait of his dead Lise, who with hair curled
a la grecque looked tenderly and gaily at him out of the gilt frame.
She did not now say those former terrible words to him, but looked
simply, merrily, and inquisitively at him. And Prince Andrew, crossing
his arms behind him, long paced the room, now frowning, now smiling,
as he reflected on those irrational, inexpressible thoughts, secret as
a crime, which altered his whole life and were connected with
Pierre, with fame, with the girl at the window, the oak, and woman's
beauty and love. And if anyone came into his room at such moments he
was particularly cold, stern, and above all unpleasantly logical.
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