Anna Karenina - Part 5

"But I say," Stepan Arkadyevitch said to him one day after he had

come back from the country, where he had got everything ready for

the young people's arrival, "have you a certificate of having

been at confession?"

"No. But what of it?"

"You can't be married without it."

"_Aïe, aïe, aïe!_" cried Levin. "Why, I believe it's nine years

since I've taken the sacrament! I never thought of it."

"You're a pretty fellow!" said Stepan Arkadyevitch laughing, "and

you call me a Nihilist! But this won't do, you know. You must

take the sacrament."

"When? There are four days left now."

Stepan Arkadyevitch arranged this also, and Levin had to go to

confession. To Levin, as to any unbeliever who respects the

beliefs of others, it was exceedingly disagreeable to be present

at and take part in church ceremonies. At this moment, in his

present softened state of feeling, sensitive to everything, this

inevitable act of hypocrisy was not merely painful to Levin, it

seemed to him utterly impossible. Now, in the heyday of his

highest glory, his fullest flower, he would have to be a liar or

a scoffer. He felt incapable of being either. But though he

repeatedly plied Stepan Arkadyevitch with questions as to the

possibility of obtaining a certificate without actually

communicating, Stepan Arkadyevitch maintained that it was out of

the question.

"Besides, what is it to you--two days? And he's an awfully nice

clever old fellow. He'll pull the tooth out for you so gently,

you won't notice it."

Standing at the first litany, Levin attempted to revive in

himself his youthful recollections of the intense religious

emotion he had passed through between the ages of sixteen and

seventeen.

But he was at once convinced that it was utterly impossible to

him. He attempted to look at it all as an empty custom, having

no sort of meaning, like the custom of paying calls. But he felt

that he could not do that either. Levin found himself, like the

majority of his contemporaries, in the vaguest position in regard

to religion. Believe he could not, and at the same time he had

no firm conviction that it was all wrong. And consequently, not

being able to believe in the significance of what he was doing

nor to regard it with indifference as an empty formality, during

the whole period of preparing for the sacrament he was conscious

of a feeling of discomfort and shame at doing what he did not

himself understand, and what, as an inner voice told him, was

therefore false and wrong.