Page 522 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

formulated certain aspects of peasant life, deduced partly
from that life itself, but chiefly from contrast with other
modes of life. He never changed his opinion of the
peasantry and his sympathetic attitude towards them.

In the discussions that arose between the brothers on
their views of the peasantry, Sergey Ivanovitch always got
the better of his brother, precisely because Sergey
Ivanovitch had definite ideas about the peasant—his
character, his qualities, and his tastes. Konstantin Levin had
no definite and unalterable idea on the subject, and so in
their arguments Konstantin was readily convicted of
contradicting himself.
I Sergey Ivanovitch’s eyes his younger brother was a
capital fellow, with his heart in the right place (as he
expressed it in French), but with a mind which, though
fairly quick, was too much influenced by the impressions
of the moment, and consequently filled with
contradictions. With all the condescension of an elder
brother he sometimes explained to him the true import of
things, but he derived little satisfaction from arguing with
him because he got the better of him too easily.
Konstantin Levin regarded his brother as a man of
immense intellect and culture, as generous in the highest
sense of the word, and possessed of a special faculty for

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