The Light Shines in Darkness.

by Leo Tolstoy.

ACT I

SCENE 1

The scene represents the verandah of a fine country-house, in front of which a croquet-lawn and tennis-court are shown, also a flower-bed. The children are playing croquet with their governess.

Mary Ivanovna Sarntsova, a handsome elegant woman of forty; her sister, Alexandra Ivanovna Kohovtseva, a stupid, determined woman of forty-five; and her husband, Peter Semyonovich Kohovtsef, a fat flabby man, dressed in a summer suit, with a pince-nez, are sitting on the verandah at a table with a samovar and coffee-pot. Mary Ivanovna Sarntsova, Alexandra Ivanovna Kohovtseva, and Peter Semyonovich Kohovtsev are drinking coffee, and the latter is smoking.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. If you were not my sister, but a stranger, and Nicholas Ivanovich not your husband, but merely an acquaintance, I should think all this very original, and perhaps I might even encourage him, _J'aurais trouve tout ca tres gentil_;[1] but when I see that _your_ husband is playing the fool--yes, simply playing the fool--then I can't help telling you what I think about it. And I shall tell your husband, Nicholas, too. _Je lui dirai son fait, ma chere._[2] I am not afraid of anyone.

[1] I should have considered it all very pretty.

[2] I will tell him the plain fact, my dear.

MARY IVaNOVNA. I don't feel the least bit hurt; don't I see it all myself? but I don't think it so very important.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. No. You don't think so, but I tell you that, if you let it go on, you will be beggared. _Du train que cela va ..._[3]

[3] At the rate things are going.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. Come! Beggared indeed! Not with an income like theirs.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. Yes, beggared! And please don't interrupt me, my dear! Anything a _man_ does always seems right to you!

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. Oh! I don't know. I was saying----

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. But you never do know what you are saying, because when you men begin playing the fool, _il n'y a pas de raison que ca finisse_.[4] I am only saying that if I were in your place, I should not allow it. _J'aurais mis bon ordre a toutes ces lubies._[5] What does it all mean? A husband, the head of a family, has no occupation, abandons everything, gives everything away, _et fait le genereux a droite et a gauche_.[6] I know how it will end! _Nous en savons quelque chose._[7]

[4] There is no reason for it to stop.

[5] I should put an end to all these fads.

[6] And plays the bountiful left and right.

[7] We know something about it.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH [to Mary Ivanovna]. But do explain to me, Mary, what is this new movement? Of course I understand Liberalism, County Councils, the Const.i.tution, schools, reading-rooms, and _tout ce qui s'en suit_;[8] as well as Socialism, strikes, and an eight-hour day; but what is this? Explain it to me.

[8] All the rest of it.

MARY IVaNOVNA. But he told you about it yesterday.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. I confess I did not understand. The Gospels, the Sermon on the Mount--and that churches are unnecessary! But then how is one to pray, and all that?

MARY IVaNOVNA. Yes. That is the worst of it. He would destroy everything, and give us nothing in its place.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. How did it begin?

MARY IVaNOVNA. It began last year, after his sister died. He was very fond of her, and her death had a very great effect on him. He became quite morose, and was always talking about death; and then, you know, he fell ill himself with typhus. When he recovered, he was quite a changed man.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. But, all the same, he came in spring to see us again in Moscow, and was very nice, and played bridge. _Il etait tres gentil et comme tout le monde._[9]

[9] He was very nice, and like everybody else.

MARY IVaNOVNA. But, all the same, he was then quite changed.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. In what way?

MARY IVaNOVNA. He was completely indifferent to his family, and purely and simply had _l'idee fixe_. He read the Gospels for days on end, and did not sleep. He used to get up at night to read, made notes and extracts, and then began going to see bishops and hermits--consulting them about religion.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. And did he fast, or prepare for communion?

MARY IVaNOVNA. From the time of our marriage--that's twenty years ago--till then he had never fasted nor taken the sacrament, but at that time he did once take the sacrament in a monastery, and then immediately afterwards decided that one should neither take communion nor go to church.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. That's what I say--thoroughly inconsistent!

MARY IVaNOVNA. Yes, a month before, he would not miss a single service, and kept every fast-day; and then he suddenly decided that it was all unnecessary. What can one do with such a man?

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. I have spoken and will speak to him again.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. Yes! But the matter is of no great importance.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. No? Not to you! Because you men have no religion.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. Do let me speak. I say that that is not the point.

The point is this: if he denies the Church, what does he want the Gospels for?

MARY IVaNOVNA. Well, so that we should live according to the Gospels and the Sermon on the Mount, and give everything away.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. But how is one to live if one gives everything away?

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. And where has he found in the Sermon on the Mount that we must shake hands with footmen? It says "Blessed are the meek,"

but it says nothing about shaking hands!

MARY IVaNOVNA. Yes, of course, he gets carried away, as he always used to. At one time it was music, then shooting, then the school. But that doesn't make it any the easier for me!

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. Why has he gone to town to-day?

MARY IVaNOVNA. He did not tell me, but I know it is about some trees of ours that have been felled. The peasants have been cutting trees in our wood.

PETER SEMYoNOVICH. In the pine-tree plantation?

MARY IVaNOVNA. Yes, they will probably be sent to prison and ordered to pay for the trees. Their case was to be heard to-day, he told me of it, so I feel certain that is what he has gone about.

ALEXaNDRA IVaNOVNA. He will pardon them, and to-morrow they will come to take the trees in the park.