the fact that you can never tell exactly what your opponent is trying to show."
Levin had many times noticed that in discussions among clever people, after an immense output of energy, an immense array of logical terms and subtleties, the disputants came at last to an acknowledgment that what they had been so interminably striving to prove to each other, was a matter of common knowledge from the very beginning, but that they liked something different and therefore were not willing to acknowledge what they liked, so as not to be controverted. He had often met with the experience that in the midst of a dispute you find what your opponent likes, and suddenly you find that you yourself like the same thing, and you immediately agree, and then all your arguments fall to the ground as useless. But sometimes he had had the opposite experience =: you at last say what you like and evolve your arguments and if perchance you speak well and sincerely, suddenly your opponent assents and ceases to uphold the other side. This is exactly what he meant.
She wrinkled her brows, trying to comprehend. But as soon as he began to explain, her mind grasped his meaning. "I understand: one must make sure why he is disputing, what he likes .... if possible ...."
She had fully grasped and expressed his badly phrased idea.
Levin smiled with rapture; so striking was the transition from the complicated prolix discussion between Pestsof and his brother to this clear, laconic, almost wordless communication of the most abstruse thoughts!
Shcherbatsky stepped away; and Kitty, going to a card-table, sat down, and taking a piece of chalk in her hand began to draw circles on the green cloth.
They took up the topic which was under discussion at dinner: as to the emancipation and occupation of women. Levin was inclined to agree with Darya Aleksandrovna, that a girl who was not going to marry would find feminine occupations in some family. He urged that not a single family can get along without some female help;
