`Well, but do sit down.'

But Levin could not sit down. He walked with his firm tread twice up and down the little cage of a room, blinked his eyelids that his tears might not fall, and only then sat down to the table.

`You must understand,' said he, `it's not love. I've been in love, but it's not that. It's not my feeling, but a sort of force outside me that has taken possession of me. I went away, you see, because I made up my mind that it could never be - you understand, like a happiness which is not of this earth; but I've struggled with myself, and I see there's no living without it. And it must be settled.'

`What did you go away for?'

`Ah, stop a minute! Ah, the thoughts that come crowding on one! The questions one must ask oneself! Listen. You can't imagine what you've done for me by what you said. I'm so happy that I've become positively hateful; I've forgotten everything. I heard today that my brother Nikolai... you know, he's here... I had forgotten even him. It seems to me that he's happy too. It's a sort of madness. But one thing's awful.... Here, you've been married, you know the feeling.... It's awful that we - fully mature - with a past... a past not of love, but of sins... are brought all at once so near to a creature pure and innocent; it's loathsome, and that's why one can't help feeling oneself unworthy.'

`Oh, well, you haven't many sins on your conscience.'

`Ah, still,' said Levin, ```When, with loathing, I go o'er my life, I shudder and I curse and bitterly regret...'' Yes.'

`What would you have? That's the way of the world,' said Stepan Arkadyevich.

`There's one comfort, like that of the prayer which I always liked: ``Forgive me not according to my deeds, but according to Thy loving-kindness.'' That's the only way she can forgive me.'