Book 3 Part 2 Chapter 24 (Chapter 211 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Prince Andrei at Kniazkovo. New views of life, love, and death. Captain Timokhin. Pierre arrives. Prince Andrei's annoyance.
Briggs: Andrey reflects on life and death. Pierre visits him.
Maude: Prince Andrew's reflections on life and death. Pierre comes to see him
Pevear and Volokhonsky (chapters 24-25): Prince Andrei's thoughts on the eve of battle. Pierre finds him. They discuss strategy and commanders. Prince Andrei's views of war. He embraces and kisses Pierre. Pierre goes back to Gorki. Prince Andrei thinks of Natasha.

Translation:

XXIV.

Prince Andrey on this clear, August evening of the 25th, lied, leaning on his arm in a broken barn in the village of Knyazkova, at the edge of the location of his regiment. At the hole of the broken walls he watched at the going along by the fence strip of thirty birch trees with chopped off bottom twigs, at arable land with the broken on it heaps of oats and at the bush, by which were seen the smoke of bonfires — the soldier kitchens.

As cramped, not needing anyone and hard now appeared to Prince Andrey his life, he so the same, as seven years to that backwards at Austerlitz, on the eve of the battle, felt himself thrilled and annoyed.

The orders for tomorrow’s battle were given and they were received. There was nothing more for him to do. Yet the thought, the most simple, clear and because of it, scary thought did not leave him alone. He knew that tomorrow’s battle must be the most scary of all those in which he participated, and the opportunity of death for the first time in his life, without any relationship to the everyday, without considerations about how it acted on others, but only by relation to the most of him, to his soul, vividly, almost with credibility, simply and terribly, presented to him. And from the heights of this presentation all that before tormented and occupied him, suddenly illuminated a cold, white light, without shadows, without perspectives, without differences of shape. All his life presented to him as a magic lantern, at which he for long watched through the glass and at artificial lighting. Now he saw suddenly, without glasses, in bright daytime light, this badly painted picture. —"Yes, yes, here there are those thrilled, admired and tormented me false images," he spoke to himself, sorting out in his imagination the cardinal picture of his magic lantern of life, looking at it in this cold, white light of day — he clearly thought about death. "Here are these rough painted figures, which presented something beautiful and mysterious. Thankfulness, the public good, love to a woman, the very fatherland — how big seemed to me this picture, what deep sense it seemed executed! And all this is so simple, pale and rough in the cold white light of this morning, which, I feel, lifts for me." The three cardinal griefs of his life in particular stopped his attention. His love to a woman, the death of his father and the French invasion, capturing half of Russia. —"Love!... This girl, which seemed to me full of mysterious forces. How again I loved her! I made poetic plans about love, about happiness with her. — Oh a sweet boy!" — with anger out loud he spoke. —"How again! I believed in that ideal love, which was for me to keep her allegiance for a whole prepared lacking year! As a gentle dove of fables, she was to waste away in separation with me. — But all this is much easier... All this is terribly simple, nasty!"

"Father also built at Bald Mountains and thought that this was his place, his land, his air, his men; but Napoleon came and, not knowing about his existence, as silver from roads, pushed him, and fell apart his Bald Mountains, and all his life. But Princess Marya speaks that this is an experiment, sent over. For what again experiment, when he now is not and will not be? Never more will he be! He is not! So who again is this experiment for? The fatherland, the death of Moscow! But tomorrow I will be killed — and not by the French even, but, as yesterday defused a soldier’s gun about a prepared ear, and will come the French, taking me behind the legs and behind the head and hurled in a pit, so I do not stink under their nose, and form new conditions of life that will also be habitual for others, and I will not know about them, and they will not know me."

He looked at the strip of birch trees with their motionless yellow, greens and white bark, brilliant in the sun. "Death, so that I am killed tomorrow, so that I was not... so that all this was, but I would not be." He lively represented himself absent from himself in this life. And these birch trees with their light and shadow, and these curly clouds, and this smoke of bonfires, all around transformed for him and appeared something terrible and threatening. A frost ran by his back. He got up fast, got out of the barn and had begun to walk.

Behind the shed he heard a voice.

— Who is there? — called out Prince Andrey.

Red nosed Captain Timohin, the former company commander of Dolohov, now, behind the decline of officers, battalion commander, timidly entered in the shed. Behind him entered an adjutant and the treasurer of the regiment.

Prince Andrey hastily got up, listened to what by service had delivered to his officers, delivered to them some more orders and tidied up to let them go, when from behind the barn was heard a familiar, whispering voice.

— Ah, damn it!670 — said the voice of a man, knocking about something.

Prince Andrey, looking out of the barn, saw the suitable to him Pierre, who stumbled on a lying pole and a little bit did not fall. To all of Prince Andrey it was unpleasant to see people from his world, in particular again Pierre, which resembled to him all those heavy minutes, which he survived in the last arrival in Moscow.

— Ah, here so! — he said. — By what destiny? Here I was not waiting.

At that time as he spoke this, in his eyes and the only expression of his face was more than dryness— was hostility, which immediately again saw Pierre. He approaching to the barn was in a very lively condition of spirit, but, seeing the expression of the face of Prince Andrey, he felt himself cramped and awkward.

— I had arrived... so... you know...I had arrived... to me it is interesting, — said Pierre, already so many times on this day pointlessly repeated this word "interesting." — I wanted to see the battle.

— Yes, yes, but what do the brother masons speak about war? How to prevent it? — said Prince Andrey mockingly. — Well what of Moscow? What of mine? Whether they have arrived finally in Moscow? — he asked seriously.

— They have arrived. Juli Drubetskaya told me. I went to them and did not catch them. They left to near Moscow.

670 Que diable! (What the devil!)

Time: August evening of the 25th
Mentioned: seven years before, the next day (also to-morrow)

Locations: Knyazkovo
Mentioned: Austerlitz, French, Russia (also Russian), Lysyya Gory, Moscow, suburban estate

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: We switch to Prince Andrei who is waiting with nothing to do with the anxiety of battle creeping up on him. He reflects on his death in passages that will be mirrored somewhat in The Death of Ivan Illyich.
"Three main griefs of his life especially held his attention. His love of a woman, the death of his father, and the French invasion that had seized half of Russia." Of course, the woman is not his dead wife, but Natasha.
"And tomorrow I'll be killed--not even by a Frenchman, but by one of our soldiers, like the one yesterday who fired his gun just next to my ear".
Pierre enters the scene by injecting comedy in it and tripping over something. Andrei treats him with hostility rather than lighting up like he normally does when seeing Pierre.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Prince Andrei

Natasha ("that young girl")

Nikolai Bolkonsky ("father")

Princess Mariya

Captain Timokhin

Dolokhof

Pierre

Julie Drubetskaya

(also the soldier that fired his musket near Andrei's head. Pierre's brotherhood of Masons is referenced derisively. Andrei refers to his "folks" in general.)

Abridged Versions: Start of Chapter 2 with no break afterwards in Bell.

Gibian: Chapter 24.

Fuller: Chapter cuts off with a line break after "I wanted to see the battle", cutting the final two paragraphs where Andrei mentions his family and Pierre mentions Julie Drubetskaya.

Komroff: Chapter cuts off with a line break before Timokhin or Pierre comes in but the inner monologuing and state of mind Andre is in is pretty well preserved.

Kropotkin: Chapter 16: Captain Timokhin is cut and the episode Andrei recalls about nearly being shot by his own soldier and the idea of being killed by his own soldiers seems to be removed.

Bromfield: Chapter 11: "There was no similarity between the person he had been in 1805 and the person he was in 1812". There is a comparison between the Timokhins and Tushins, who he basically sees as animals, but still more respectful than the Nesvitskys, Kutaisovs, and Czartoryskys, who he sees as liars that use human suffering to get what they want. The inner monologuing is longer, and the "Oh my dear boy" stands out as making more sense in this version. There is a concentration on Anatole and the idea of him caressing Natasha. Timokhin doesn't appear, though Pierre now comes in and Andrei has a similar reaction to him. "Without knowing why, Prince Andrei felt uncomfortable looking him straight in the eye." No break.

Simmons: Chapter 24: Prince Andrew's reflections are a little shorter.

Additional Notes:

Hadji-Murat (Aplin): Page 3: “I had gathered a large bunch of different flowers and was walking home when in a ditch I noticed a full bloom a wonderful crimson thistle of the sort that is called in Russia a ‘Tatar’, which people take pains to avoid when mowing, and which, when it is accidentally cut down, is thrown out of the hay by the mowers so that they do not prick their hands on it. I took it into my head to pick this thistle and put it in the middle of the bunch. I climbed down into the ditch and, driving off the fuzzy bumble-bee that had sunk itself into the heart of the flower where it had fallen into a sweet and languorous sleep, I set about picking the flower. But this was very difficult: not only did the stem prick me on all sides, even through the handkerchief in which I wrapped my hand, but it was so terribly strong that I struggled with it for some five minutes, tearing through fibres one at a time. When I finally plucked the flower off, the stem was already quite ragged, and the flower no longer seemed so fresh and pretty either. Moreover, in its coarseness and clumsiness it did not go with the delicate flowers of the bunch. I felt regret at having needlessly ruined a flower which had been fine in its place, and I threw it away. ‘Yet what energy and life-force,’ I thought, recalling the effort with which I had picked the flower. ‘How vigorously it defended, and how dearly it sold its life.’

Page 4: “‘What a destructive, cruel being man is, how many different living creatures and plans has he annihilated to sustain his own life,’....’What energy!’ I thought. ‘Man has conquered everything, destroyed millions of blades of grass, but this fellow refuses to surrender.’”

Anna Karenina (Pevear and Volkhonsky): "'It's a secret that's necessary and important for me alone and inexpressible in words. 'This new feeling hasn't changed me, hasn't made me happy or suddenly enlightened, as I dreamed - just like the feeling for my son. Nor was there any surprise. And faith or not faith - I don't know what it is - but this feeling has entered into me just as imperceptibly through suffering and has firmly lodged itself in my soul. 'I'll get angry in the same way with the coachmen Ivan, argue in the same way, speak my mind inappropriately, there will be the same wall between my soul's holy of holies and other people, even my wife, I'll accuse her in the same way of my own fear and then regret it, I'll fail in the same way to understand with my reason why I pray, and yet I will pray - but my life now, my whole life, regardless of all that may happen to me, every minute of it, is not only not meaningless, as it was before, but has the unquestionable meaning of the good which it is in my power to put into it!'"

Rancour-Laferriere: Page 187: “It should be noted that Pierre’s generosity in 1812 is different from what it was several years earlier. This is especially true of the rescues. They result from a completely spontaneous compassion for the potential victim...They are not part of some dreamy humanitarianism or striving for self-perfection that characterized his Masonic period. Pierre has climbed out of that narcissistic morass, at least for the time being.”

Book 3 Part 2 Chapter 23 (Chapter 210 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Riding round the lines. The Kurgannaya battery. Bagration's fleches. The hare. Benigsen changes one of Kutuzof's dispositions.
Briggs: Bennigsen explains the army position; it is all beyond Pierre.
Maude: Pierre rides to the left flank with Bennigsen who explains the 'position' in a way Pierre does not understand, and changes one of Kutuzov's dispositions
Pevear and Volokhonsky: The Russian disposition from Gorki to the extreme left flank.

Translation:

XXIII.

Bennigsen from Gorky came down by the big road to the bridge, at which Pierre was pointed out by the officer from the mound, as at the center of positions, and at which the guard lied ranks of beveled smelling hay grass. Across the bridge they drove through the village of Borodino, from there turning to the left and past a huge quantity of troops and guns left of the high mound, at which the militias dug the land. This was the redoubt, still not having a title, then receiving the name of the redoubt of Raevsky or the barrow battery.

Pierre did not turn particular attention to this redoubt. He did not know that this place would for him be more memorable than all the places of the Borodino field. Then they went across the ravine to Semenovsky, at which the soldiers pulled away the last logs of the huts and barns. Then under the mountain and at the mountain they drove forward across the break, knocked out as by hail rye, again paved by the artillery the thorns of arable land the road in flushes,669 also then digging still.

Bennigsen had stopped at the flushes and began to look forward at the Shevardin redoubt (formerly, still yesterday, ours), at which could be seen a few riders. The officers said that there was Napoleon or Murat. And all greedily looked at this bunch of riders. Pierre also watched there, trying to guess which of these a little bit seen people was Napoleon. Finally the horsemen moved out from the mound and hid.

Bennigsen turned to an approaching to him general and began to explain all the position of our troops. Pierre listened to the words of Bennigsen, straining all his mental forces so to understand the essence of the lying ahead battle, but with chagrin felt that his mental abilities for this were insufficient. He understood nothing. Bennigsen ceased to speak and, noticing the figure of the listening Pierre, spoke suddenly to him.

— You, I think, are not interested?

— Ah, the opposite, very interested, — repeated Pierre, not really truly.

From the flush they went more to the dear left, curly by the often low, birch wood. In the middle of this forest jumped out before them at the road a brown with white feet hare, and, scared by the stomp of the quantity of horses, it was so confused that it for long hopped by the road ahead of them, exciting common attention and laughing, and only when a few voices shouted at it, it rushed to the side and hid more often. Driving two versts by the wood, they left to the clearing, at which were standing the troops of the corps of Tuchkov, who should protect the left flank.

Here, at the extreme left flank, Bennigsen much and hotly spoke and did, as it seemed to Pierre, the majority in the military regarding the disposition. Ahead of the location the troops of Tuchkov were found in elevation. This elevation was not occupied by troops. Bennigsen loudly criticized this mistake, saying that it was crazy to leave unoccupied the commander of the terrain at this height and put troops below it. Some generals expressed that same opinion. One in particular with military fervor spoke about how they were put here to be slaughtered. Bennigsen ordered by his name to move the troops at the height.

This disposition at the left flank still more made Pierre doubt in his abilities to understand military business. Listening to Bennigsen and the generals, condemning the position of the troops below the mountain, Pierre quite understood them and shared their opinion; but owing to this he could not understand in what way could that who put them here below the mountain could make such an obvious and brutal mistake.

Pierre did not know that these troops were delivered not for the defense of the positions, as thought Bennigsen, but were delivered in a hidden place for ambush, i.e. so that to be unnoticed and to suddenly hit at the moving forward enemy. Bennigsen did not know this and moved the troops forward by special considerations, not telling about this to the commander in chief.

669

A kind of strengthening. [Note. L.N. Tolstoy]

Time: see previous chapter

Locations: Gorki, Borodino, Raevski redoubt (also called the Mound Battery. battery of the barrow in Pevear and Volokhonsky. battery on the mound in Briggs. Knoll Battery in Maude, Dunnigan, and Mandelker (who uses a hyphen).), Semenovskoe, Shevardino redoubt

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: Tolstoy gives us dramatic historic irony by pointing out the Raevsky redoubt that would become famous, only for the characters, especially Pierre, to gloss over it in preparation for the battle. Tolstoy adds a footnote to clarify "fleches" rather than just using "a kind of fortification" for some reason. There is a clear disconnect between Bennigsen and Pierre. For the most part, the chapter lays out the positioning of the troops. Pierre does not understand any of it. The most important part however (and in a subversion of the usual Tolstoyian trope of the simple seeing the flaws in the complicated) comes at the end of the chapter, where Bennigsen moves troops Kutuzov had placed for an ambush and not telling him, highlighting the problem of lack of communication and agreement in the Russian military.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Benigsen

Pierre

Rayevsky (as in the expository chapter a few chapters ago, his redoubt is mentioned.)

Napoleon

Murat

Tutchkof (his corps are mentioned. "Tuchkov" in Wiener, Edmonds, and Briggs. "Tutchkov" in Garnett. "Toutchkow" in Bell.)

Kutuzof ("commander-in-chief")

(the officer on the hill-top from a couple of chapters ago is also referenced. The landwehr is referenced again, as are, of course, soldiers and generals that talk with Benigsen.)

Abridged Versions: End of Chapter 1 in Bell. Edmonds, Briggs, and Garnett do not put the footnote.

Gibian: Chapter 23.

Fuller: Chapter ends, with a line break, after the horses they see while trying to look for Napoleon, ride out of sight. This leaves out the movement of the troops by Benigsen.

Komroff: Entire chapter is cut.

Kropotkin: Entire chapter is cut.

Bromfield: Pierre is chewing meatballs while lying about the positions being interesting, which adds some humor. After the episode with Bennigsen, Pierre goes back to Kutaisov and Kutuzov. Here is where Dolokhov appears and he takes Boris's role in the last chapter in the latter version by talking about how they need to beef up the left flank. End of chapter 10.

Simmons: Chapter 23: entire chapter is cut and replaced with "Bennigsen shows Pierre the position of the Russian forces before the battle of Borodino and also alters one of Kutuzov's dispositions without understanding its purpose."

Additional Notes:

Kaufman: Page 74: “In all my years of teaching War and Peace, I’ve met few readers who are bothered by or even notice his (Boris) sudden disappearance from the novel, ending up where such people often end up in life: forgotten…

Segur/Townsend: Page 62: "he (Napoleon) recalled what had been told him concerning Kutuzov's slowness and negligence, remarking that he was surprised that the Russians should have preferred him to Bennigsen."

Herold: Page 353: “...the first major encounter of the campaign...Napoleon, who had mistaken it...arrived on the battlefield only the following day...In the hospitals the surgeons ran out of dressings and used paper and birchbark fibers as substitutes; many of those who survived surgery died of starvation, for the supply service had virtually broken down...hundreds of men fell victim to the Russian secret weapon, vodka, dying by the roadside from a combination of raw spirits and exposure...Kutuzov’s address was then read...to the thousands of peasant militiamen...as the first crusaders had done seven centuries earlier...There was no ceremonies in the French camp.”

Book 3 Part 2 Chapter 21 (Chapter 208 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Bird's-eye view of the battle-field The officer's account of the Russian position. The procession of the Iverskaya Virgin. The field Te Deum. Kutuzof before the Ikon.
Briggs: The Icon of Smolensk is deeply revered by the soldiers and Kutuzov.
Maude: Pierre ascends a knoll at Gorki, surveys the scene and inquires as to the 'position' occupied. A procession carrying the 'Smolensk Mother of God'. The reverence of the crowd and of Kutuzov
Pevear and Volokhonsky: Pierre arrives in Gorki. He surveys the battlefield. The icon of the Smolensk Mother of God is brought. Prayer service. Kutuzov is there.

Translation:

XXI.

Pierre got out from the crew and past the working militias rising on that mound, from which, as said to him by the doctor, was seen the field of the battle.

It was 11 in the morning. The sun stood some to the left and the back of Pierre and brightly illuminated, through the clean, rare air, the huge amphitheater by the rising terrain opened before him as a panorama.

Up and to the left by this amphitheater, cutting open to him, curled the big Smolensk road, walking through sat down with a white church, lying at 500 steps ahead of the mound and lower to him (this was Borodino). The road passed under the village through the bridge and through descents and a lifting curl all higher and higher to the six seen versts behind the village of Valuev (at it stood now Napoleon). Behind the Valuev road was hiding the yellowed wood in the horizon. At this wood of birch and spruce, to the right from the direction of the roads, glittered in the sun further the cross and bell tower of the Kolotsky monastery. Throughout this blue, to the right and to the left from the forest and roads, at different places were seen smoking fires and undefined masses of our troops and the enemy. To the right, by the current of the rivers Koloch and Moscow, the terrain was gorge and mountainous. Between the gorge away was seen the villages of Bezzobovo (Toothless) and Zaharino. On the left the terrain was smoother, were fields with bread, and could be seen only a smoking, burnt village — Semenovskaya.

All of what saw Pierre to the right and left was so vague that the left, or right side of the field did not quite satisfy him in presentation. Everywhere was not the field of battle, which he saw, but fields, glades, troops, forests, smoke of bonfires, villages, mounds, streams; and how much it was assorted to Pierre, he at this alive terrain could not find positions, and could not even distinguish our troops from the enemy.

"I need to ask the knowing," he thought, and turned to an officer, with curiosity watching his non-military, huge figure.

— Let me ask, — turned Pierre to the officer, — this is what village ahead?

— Burdino or so? — said the officer, with the issue turning to his friend.

— Borodino, — was the mending response of the other.

The officer, apparently satisfied in the case to talk, moved to Pierre.

— There is ours? — asked Pierre.

— Yes, but out a little farther is the French, — said the officer. — They are out of visibility.

— Where? Where? — asked Pierre.

— The simple eye sees it. Yes here! — the officer showed his hand in the smoke, seen to the left behind the river, and on his face appeared that strict and serious expression, which Pierre saw in many faces, meeting him.

— Ah, this is French! But there?.. — Pierre showed to the left at the mound, about which were seen troops.

— This is ours.

— Ah, ours! But there?... — Pierre showed a different far away mound with a big wood beside the village, visible at the gorge, at which also smoked fires and something blackened.

— This is again he, — said the officer. (This was the Shevardin redoubt.) — Yesterday it was ours, but now his.

— So how again is our position?

— Position? — said the officer about a smile of pleasure, — I this can say to you clearly because of how almost all of our strengthening is built. Whether here, you see our center at Borodino, here, here. He pointed out to the village with the white church, formerly ahead. — Here is the crossing across the Koloch. Here, here, see, where still in the low ranks beveled hay lies, here, here and the bridge. This is our center. The right flank of ours is here (he pointed out cooly to the right, long away to the gorge), there is the Moscow-river, and there we built three redoubts very strongly. The left flank... — here the officer had stopped. — Whether you see, this is difficult to explain to you... Yesterday our left flank was out there, at Shevardin, out, see, where the oak is; but now we carried off backwards to the left wing, now it is out, see the village and smoke? — This is Semenovskaya, yes here, here, — he pointed out to the mound of Raevsky. — Whether only here the battle will hardly be. That he leads across here troops, this is cheating; he rightly will bypass to the right from Moscow. Well, yes where would it be, many tomorrow will not be count! — said the officer.

An old noncommissioned officer, approaching to the officer in the time of his story, silently seeing the end of the speech of his chief; but in this location he, obviously displeased at the words of the officer, interrupted him.

— For tours we need to go, — he said strictly.

The officer as if embarrassed, as if he got that one can think about many counts tomorrow, but should not speak about this.

— Well yes, send the third company again, — hastily said the officer.

— But who again, not from the doctors?

— No, I will so, — was the response of Pierre. And Pierre went below the mountain again past the militias.

— Ah, damned! — spoke the following behind him officer, pinching his nose and running past the working.

— Here they are!.. Carry, go... Here it is... Now enter... — suddenly was heard a voice, and the officers, soldiers and militias ran forward by the road.

From below the mountains from Borodino was lifted a church procession. Ahead of all by the dusty road harmoniously went the infantry with removed shakos and guns, omitted. Behind the infantry was heard church singing.

Overtaking Pierre, without hats running, going towards it, were soldiers and militias.

— The mother is carried! The intercessor!.. Iverskaya!..

— The Smolensk mother, — corrected another.

The militias and those that were in the village, and those which worked in the battery, threw up their shovels and ran towards the church procession. Behind the battalion, walking by the dusty road, went robed priests, one old man in a cowl with clergy and singers. Behind them soldiers and officers carried a big, with a black face on metal coating, icon. This was the icon exported from Smolensk and from this time carried behind the army. Behind the icon, around it, ahead of it, going with all parties, ran and bowed on the land with naked heads crowds of the military.

Rising on the mountain, the icon stopped; the holding in towels icon people had changed, the sexton lit again the censer, and had begun a prayer. The hot rays of the sun sheerly beat from above; the weak, fresh wind played on the hair of the open heads and the ribbons which were on the cleaned up icon; singing quietly distributed from below the open sky. A huge crowd with the open heads of officers, soldiers, and militias surrounded the icon. Behind the priest and sexton in the purified location were standing bureaucratic people. One bald general with a George on his neck stood behind all behind the back of the priest and not crossing, (obviously a German) patiently waited for the end of the prayer service, which he counted fit to listen to probably for the excitement of patriotism in the Russian people. Another general stood in a warlike pose and shook his hand before his breast, looking back around himself. Between this bureaucratic circle Pierre, standing in a crowd of peasants, found some acquaintances; but he did not watch them: all his attention was swallowed up by the severe expression of the persons in this crowd of soldiers and militias, monotonously and greedily watching the icon. Only as the tired sexton (singing the twentieth prayer) began to lazily and habitually sing: "Save from trouble your slaves, Virgin," and the priest and deacon picked up: "like all by God to you come running, like an unbreakable wall and representation" — in all faces flared up again that same expression of consciousness of the solemnity of the coming minutes, which he saw below the mountain at Mozhayck and in fits and starts on many and many faces, meeting them on this morning; and more often lowered heads, was shaken hair, and heard sighs and strokes of crosses by breasts.

The crowd, surrounding the icon, suddenly opened up and pressed Pierre. Someone, probably a very major face, judging by the haste with which before him shunned, approached to the icon.

This was Kutuzov, travelling to the position. He, returning to Tatarinov, came up to the prayer. Pierre immediately again found Kutuzov by his special, distinguished from all figure.

In a long frock coat on his huge thick body, with a stooped back, with an open white head, and with a leaking, white eye on his swollen face, Kutuzov entered with his diving, swaying gait to the circle and stopped behind the priest. He crossed himself in a habitual gesture, took out his hand to the earth and, heavily sighing, lowered his gray-haired head. Behind Kutuzov was Bennigsen and his suite. Despite the presence of the commander in chief, who drew on himself attention from all the higher ranks, militias and soldiers, not looking at him, continued to pray.

When his prayer was over, Kutuzov came up to the icon, heavily lowered on a knee, bowing on the land, and for long tried to and could not get up from weight and weakness. The gray hair on his head twitched from effort. Finally he got up and with childish naivete pulled his lips to kiss the icon and again bowed, touching his hand to the earth. Generals followed his example; then officers, and behind them, crushing each other, stomping, panting and pushing, with excited faces, climbed soldiers and militias.

Time: eleven o'clock in the morning.
Mentioned: yesterday, to-morrow

Locations: Borodino (called "Burdino" by an officer.)
Mentioned: Smolensk, Valuevo, Kolocha, Moskva, Bezzubovo, Zakharino (Zakharyino in Pevear and Volokhonsky), Semenovskoe, French, Shevardino, Raevski's Mound (called a knoll in Dunnigan, Maude, and Mandelker. hill in Bell and Dole.), Iver Church, German, Russian, Mozhaysk, Tatarinovo

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: Pierre is able to overlook everything and Tolstoy gives us quite a description. However, Pierre is unable to make sense of the battle and the first people he asks argues about the pronunciation of Borodino. After soldiers try to explain the position and bicker with each other, Pierre sees a church procession carrying the Mother of God from Smolensk. While the soldiers go to bow down to it, Tolstoy can't help himself from having "obviously a German" not cross himself. Kutuzov comes up to the prayer service and gets another description and bows before the icon.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Pierre 

Napoleon (the "he" also refers to Napoleon and his army as a whole.)

Kutuzof

Benigsen

(the doctor Pierre talked to in the previous chapter is mentioned, as well as the land-wehr. Also, of course, the Russian and French troops Pierre can see. Pierre also talks to two officers. An additional old non-commissioned officer also approaches. Also, when the icon is brought, the priests and diatchok, the German general, as well as other generals.)

Abridged Versions:
Gibian: Chapter 21.
Fuller: Some of the description of the icon procession is removed, but the chapter is basically preserved and followed by a line break.
Komroff: The description at the beginning of the chapter is shortened. The Buridino/Borodino joke is removed. The long-winded explanation by the officer is severely shortened. The rest of the chapter is preserved, followed by a line break.
Kropotkin: The description at the beginning of the chapter is shortened. The explanation by the soldiers is severely shortened and the icon episode is completely removed. No break again.
Bromfield: Plays out somewhat the same the same except the church procession is a much smaller production as far as focus, and the focus is on Bennigsen, not Kutuzov. Bennigsen talks to Pierre.
Simmons: Chapter 21: the discussion Pierre has with the officers about the position, as well as the Burdino/Borodino joke is removed, as is the German that doesn't cross himself.

Edmundson: Act Three Scene 15: After Pierre has the discussion with the officers, we see Napoleon giving his speech and then the episode with De Beausset and the painting of his son. Pierre then talks with a doctor and meets Kutuzov before we go back to Napoleon's conversation with De Beausset. Parts of Napoleon's rant to Balashev is also here. The conversation about whether the rice has been delivered is also here in the conversation with De Beausset. We go there to the Aide telling Kutuzov about the pillaging and then Andrei and Kutuzov have their conversation. Dolohov then appears and asks Pierre for forgiveness. Napoleon gives part of the disposition to De Beausset and his view of military strength. Andrei tells Kutuzov about the health of his father (who is not dead yet). From there we go to Bald Hills where Bolkonsky tells Maria and Little Nikolai to leave while he stays. In the middle of the conversation Bolkonsky has the stroke. Then we go to Pierre and Andrei.This episode plays out, including with Timohin, just about the same as in the book. This is followed by the procession of the icon of Smolensk. This allows for Andrei's reflection before the battle and happens simultaneously as Natasha's religious moment in the novel as well as a prayer from Maria. The battle begins and Edmundson says in the stage directions that the emphasis should be on Pierre's changing attitude toward it. Nikolai, Anatole, and Dolohov are all in the scene and Anatole gets Nikolai's lines from early in the novel expressing surprise that anyone would want to kill him. Dolohov also gets a line about crossing the line between life and death. Kutuzov only gets the positive report from an officer. As Pierre begins to run we get Napoleon's moment where he refuses to bring in more reinforcements. Then there is the exploding of the shell near Andrei before going back to Napoleon. Then we get Dolohov and a general giving conflicting to reports to Kutuzov (these happen concurrently rather than separately). Bolkonsky is then brought in while wounded and we even get the "Even in heaven they're going to jump the queue". After he sees Anatole losing his leg, he sees Natasha singing. We go from there to Bald Hills for the elder Bolkonsy's death scene. Kutuzov and an Aide talk about whether or not they will retreat and abandon Moscow. Napoleon has a moment with an aide in their request for reinforcements and a shortened moment with De Beausset wanting to congratulate him on a victory. Pierre then confronts Napoleon on what has happened and the two argue over what they really want and the purpose of the war. Pierre tells him that he will kill him in Moscow.

Additional Notes: Bell: Napoleon was very commonly spoken of as "Lui," both by his enemies and his admirers. A poem of Victor Hugo's begins “ Toujour: Lui, Luipartout.“

Durant: Page 703: All through September 6 the rival hosts prepared for battle...hardly anyone slept. At 2 A.M. Napoleon sent out a proclamation, to be read…”...the victory depends upon you...It will give us abundance, good winter quarters, and an early return to our fatherland.” That night, by order of Kutuzov, the priests who accompanied his army carried through his camp an icon of the “Black Virgin,” which had been rescued from burning Smolensk...Napoleon...spent much of the night issuing directions to his officers for the morrow’s tactics. It must have been difficult for him to sleep.”

Segur/Townsend: Page 60: "In the name of religion and equality he (Kutuzov) sought to incite the serfs to defend their masters' possessions. Holding up the icon that had taken refuge in their ranks, he appealed to their courage and fanned their indignation. He spoke of Napoleon as "a universal despot, a tyrannical disturber of the peace of the world, a worm, an arch-rebel who overthrew their altars and defiled them with blood; who exposed the Ark of the Lord, represented by the Smolensk icon, to the profanation of men and to the ravages of the seasons."...Shut up within a narrow circle by slavery, they were reduced to a limited number of sensations which became the only source of their needs, their desires, or their ideas."

Tolstoy's Letters (Christian): Page 546: “You want to institute Land Captains with birch-rods instead of Justice of the Peace; that is your business, but we will not be tried by your Land Captains, nor will we ourselves be appointed to this office. You want to make trial by jury a mere formality; that is your business, but we will not serve as judges, or as lawyers, or as jurymen. You want to establish lawlessness under cover of the “state of emergency”, that is your business, but we will not participate in it and will plainly call the “state of emergency” an illegality, and the death sentences inflicted without trial--murder. You want to set up classical grammar schools with military exercises and religious instruction, or Cadet Corps; that is your business, but we will not be teachers in them, or send our children to them, but will educate them as we consider best. You want to reduce the zemstvo to a nullity; we will not participate in it. You forbid the printing of what you don’t like; you can seize and burn books, and punish the printers, but you can’t prevent us from writing and talking, and we shall do so. You order us to swear allegiance to the Tsar; we will not do so, because it is stupid, false and base. You order us to serve in the army; we will not do so, because we consider mass murder to be an act just as offensive to our conscience as a single murder and, above all, the promise to kill whoever a commander orders is the basest act a man can perform. You profess a religion a thousand years behind the times, with the Iverskaya icon, relics and coronations; that is your business, but we not only do not acknowledge this idolatry and superstition to be religion, but we call it superstition and idolatry and are trying to rescue people from it.”

Book 3 Part 2 Chapter 22 (Chapter 209 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Boris Drubetskoi. Proposes to Pierre to witness the battle with Benigsen's staff. Criticises Kutuzof. Paisi Sergeyevitch Kaisarof. Kutuzof summons Pierre. Dolokhof again. Marin's poem. Dolokhof apologizes. Benigsen's invitation.
Briggs: Kutuzov notices Pierre. Dolokhov wants Pierre to be reconciled.
Maude: Boris meets Pierre. Dolokhov makes his way to Kutuzov. Kutuzov notices Pierre. Dolokhov asks Pierre to be reconciled
Pevear and Volokhonsky: Pierre runs into Boris Drubetskoy. Discussions of the coming action Dolokhov and Kutuzov. Dolokhov asks Pierre's forgiveness. Pierre accompanies Bennigsen on a ride along the line.

Translation:

XXII.

Swaying from the crush encompassing him, Pierre looked around himself.

— Count, Petr Kirilych! How are you here? — said someone’s voice. Pierre turned back.

Boris Drubetskoy, cleaning with his hand his knees, which he dirtied (probably also applying to the icon), smilingly approached to Pierre. Boris was dressed elegantly, with a tint of campaign militancy. On him was a long frock coat and lash across his shoulder, so the same as Kutuzov.

Kutuzov between that came up to the village and sat down in the shadows of the nearest home on the bench, which brought one running Cossack, but another hastily covered it with a rug. A huge, brilliant suite surrounded the commander in chief.

The icon set off farther, accompanied by a crowd. Pierre at thirty steps from Kutuzov had stopped, talking with Boris.

Pierre explained his intention to participate in the battle and to explore the position.

— Here is how to do it, — said Boris. — I will treat you to the camp.667 Better only for you to see all from there where Count Bennigsen is. I will take you to his place. I will report to him. But if you want to go round the position, then go with us: we now go to the left flank. But then return and I beg you with mercy to spend the night and make up a party. Because you are familiar with Dmitry Sergeich? He here stands, — he pointed out to the third house at Gorky.

— Yet I would want to see the right flank; they say, it is very strong, — said Pierre. — I would want to drive through from the Moscow river and all the position.

— Well, this may be afterward, but the main is — the left flank...

— Yes, yes. But where is the regiment of Prince Bolkonsky, may you not indicate it to me? — asked Pierre.

— Andrey Nikolaevich? We will pass by, I will conduct you to him.

— What is the left flank? — asked Pierre.

— By the truth to you I say, between us,668, our left flank is in God knows which position, — said Boris, trustingly lowering his voice; — Count Bennigsen is really not that assumed. He assumed to reinforce that mound, really it is not so... but — Boris shook his shoulders. — The lordly did not want, or have spoken to him. Because... — and Boris did not finish talking, because of how at this time to Pierre came up Kaysarov, the adjutant of Kutuzov. — Ah! Paisiy Sergeich, — said Boris with a free smile, turning to Kaysarov. — But I am here trying to explain to the count the position. — It is surprising, how the lordly could so rightly guess the plans of the French!

— Are you about the left flank? — said Kaysarov.

— Yes, yes, it was. Our left flank is now very, very strong.

Despite that, how Kutuzov drove out all extra from the staff, Boris, after the change produced by Kutuzov, managed to hold on at the main apartment. Boris settled down to Count Bennigsen. Count Bennigsen, as all people at which Boris was found out, counted young Prince Drubetskoy an unappreciated human.

In the bosses of the army were two sharp, certain parties: the party of Kutuzov and the party of Bennigsen, the chief of staff. Boris was found out in this last party, and no one as he was able to pay slavish respect to Kutuzov, and give the feeling that the old man was bad, and that all the business underway was Bennigsen’s. Now had come the decisive minute of battle, which should destroy Kutuzov and deliver power to Bennigsen, or, if even Kutuzov should win the battle, was given the feeling that all was done by Bennigsen. In every case for tomorrow the day must be handed out large awards and put forward new people. And owing to this, Boris was found out in an annoyed revival all of this day.

Behind Kaysarov to Pierre still came up others of his acquaintances, and he had not had time to respond to the interrogations about Moscow, which they poured onto him, and did not have time to listen to stories which were made to him. On all faces expressed revitalization and anxiety. But to Pierre it seemed that the cause of excitement, expressed on some of these persons, lied more in questions of personal success, and in it did not come out of his head that another expression of excitement, which he saw on the other faces and which spoke about questions not of personal, but common questions of life and death. Kutuzov saw the figure of Pierre and the group gathered about him.

— Call him to me, — said Kutuzov. The adjutant delivered the wish of the lordly, and Pierre directed him to the bench. But still before he was to Kutuzov came up to him a private of the militia. This was Dolohov.

— How is this here? — asked Pierre.

— This is such a beast, everywhere he crawls through! — was the answer to Pierre. — Because he was demoted. Now he needs to break through. Some projects were given and in the chain of the enemy at night he climbed... but well done!...

Pierre, by removing his hat, respectfully bent down before Kutuzov.

— I decided that if I will report to your lordship, you may drive me away or say that you know that, how I report, and then I will not subside... — spoke Dolohov.

— So, so.

— But if I am right, that I bring favor to the homeland, for which I am ready to die.

— So... so...

— And if your lordships will need a person who would not pity their skins, then please remember about me... maybe, I will come in handy to your lordship.

— So... so... — repeated Kutuzov, laughing, his shrinking eye looking at Pierre.

At this time Boris, with his court dexterity, moved forward nearby with Pierre close to the superiors and with a very natural look and not loudly as would beginning a conversation, said to Pierre:

— Militias — those all put on a clean, white shirt, so that to prepare for death. What heroism, count!

Boris said this to Pierre obviously so that to be heard by the lordly. He knew that Kutuzov turned attention to these words, and really the lordly turned to him:

— What do you speak about the militia? — he said to Boris.

— They, your lordship, preparing for tomorrow, for death, put on a white shirt.

— Ah!... Wonderful, incomparable people, — said Kutuzov and, closing his eye, shook his head. — Incomparable people! — he repeated with a sigh.

— Want to smell gunpowder? — he said to Pierre. — Yes, an agreeable smell. I have the honor to be an adorer of your spouse, is she healthy? My halt to your services. — And, as this often is with old people, Kutuzov began to absent-mindedly look back, as if forgetting all that he needed to say or do.

Obviously remembering that what he sought, he lured to himself Andrey Sergeich Kaysarov, the brother of his adjutant.

— How, how, how is that poem of Marina, how is the poem, how? How in Gerakova was written: "I will be a corpus teacher..." say, say, — began talking Kutuzov, obviously going to laugh. Kaysarov read... Kutuzov, smiling, nodded his head in tact with the poem.

When Pierre walked away from Kutuzov, Dolohov, having moved to him, took him by his arm.

— Very glad to meet you here, count, — he said to him loudly and not embarrassed by the presence of strangers, with a special determination and solemnity. — On the eve of the day, on which God knows who of us is destined to stay alive, I am glad to have the occasion to say to you that I regret about those misunderstandings which were between us, and would desire so that you had nothing against me. I beg you to forgive me.

Pierre smilingly looked at Dolohov, not knowing what to say to him. Dolohov with tears protruding in his eyes, hugged and kissed Pierre.

Boris said something to his general, and Count Bennigsen turned to Pierre and proposed to go with himself together by the lines.

— This will be interesting for you, — he said.

— Yes, very interesting, — said Pierre.

In half an hour Kutuzov left to Tatarinov, and Bennigsen with the suite, in the number of which was Pierre, went by the lines.

667 Je vous ferai les honneurs du camp (I will do you the honors of the camp)

668 entre nous (between us)

Time: see previous chapter, half an hour later

Locations: see previous chapter
Mentioned: Moskva River, French, Moscow, Tatarinovo


Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: Boris Drubetskoy appears and the description of his dress and uniform is matched by the description of Kutuzov's "immense, brilliant suite" surrounding him. Boris tells Pierre to go to where Bennigsen is so he can see everything. Pierre wants to see the left flank, but Boris keeps wanting to show him the right flank. Boris talks up Bennigsen's plan over Kutuzov's until Kutuzov's adjutant appears, in which he talks up Kutuzov's. Tolstoy then spends some time describing how Boris has managed to hang on to his position and the divide between the Bennigsen and Kutuzov camps.
"it seemed to Pierre that the cause of the agitation which showed on some of the faces lay mostly in questions of personal success, and he could not get out of his head those other expressions of agitation, which he had seen on other faces and which spoke of questions that were not personal but general, questions on life and death."
Dolokhov appears and speaks to Kutuzov in a way reminiscent of the way he speaks after the early battle in trying to get his rank back. The others speak to Pierre about getting "a whiff of powder", another call back to the early parts of the novel.
Most importantly for the development of the characters, Dolokhov approaches Pierre and ask for forgiveness. Pierre does not know what to say, but they embrace.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Pierre (called "Count Piotr Kiriluitch" by Boris.)

Prince Boris Drubetskoi

Kutuzof (Also "commander-in-chief" in Wiener and Dunnigan, though Dole, Maude, and Bell opt for just the pronoun him. Also "serene higness". Also a Cossack that brings out a bench for him.)

Count Benigsen

Dmitri Sergeyevitch (this may or may not be Dokhturof from Chapter 35. "Dmitri Sergyeich" in Wiener. "Dmitri Sergeich" in Dunnigan and Edmonds. "Dmitry Sergeitch" in Garnett. "Dmitri Sergeevich" in Maude and Mandelker. "Dmitriy Sergeich" in Briggs. "Dmitri Serguéiévitch" in Bell.)

Prince Andrei Nikolayevitch Bolkonsky (Garnett uses "Nikolaevitch" for the second name. "Nikolaevich" in Mandelker and Wiener. "Nikolayevich" in Dunnigan. Edmonds, Bell, and Briggs drop it.) 

Paisi Sergeyitch Kaisarof (one of Kutuzof's adjutants. "Paisy Sergeich Kaisarov" in Dunnigan (with Garnett differing on just the second name with "Sergeitch", see above). Just "Kaysarov" in Maude, Briggs, and Mandelker.)

Dolokhof (described as "a private of militia".)

Helen (just "wife".)

Andrei Sergeyevitch Kaisarof (Paisi's brother. See above for spelling variations.)

(You can debate on whether Marin and Gerakof should be considered references or mentioned characters. Also other acquaintances that approach Pierre and another adjutant that Kutuzof uses to get Pierre. There are also references to the militias at large.)

Abridged Versions: The scanning of Dole on pages 212-213 has overlaps from previous pages that can make it difficult to read the top of the pages. No break in Bell.
Gibian: Chapter 22.
Fuller: The concentration on Boris, his argument about the flank and the difference between the Benigsen and Kutuzov camps is removed. The Dolokhov section is removed and there is no line break.
Komroff: The section where Pierre reflects on the interests of those asking him all the questions about Moscow is removed. The two Kaisarof adjutants are also removed, though we do keep the focus on Boris and the Bennigsen and Kutuzov camps. Followed by a line break.
Kropotkin: The sections of the divide between Kutuzof and Benigsen and the two Kaisarof adjutants are removed, as is the section where Pierre cannot answer the questions of those asking him about Moscow. Chapter 15 also ends a little early, with it ending on Dolokhof and Pierre embracing, cutting out Pierre following Benigsen, a plot point, as we'll see, that is cut completely.
Bromfield: Since we already have Pierre following Bennigsen and there is no need for the forgiveness of Dolokhov since Pierre had already been around him previously in this version, there really isn't a comparative chapter. Boris doesn't show up here.
Simmons: Chapter 22: chapter is basically preserved.

Additional Notes:

Book 3 Part 2 Chapter 20 (Chapter 207 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Pierre leaves Mozhaisk. The train of wounded. The cavalry regiment. The singers. Pierre and the soldiers. Pierre and the doctor. Pierre's reflections before the battle. Pierre reaches Gorki. The landwehr at work on the fortifications.
Briggs: Pierre arrives in the theatre of war and seeks out the army's position.
Maude: Pierre encounters cavalry advancing and carts of wounded retiring. He talks to an army doctor. Pierre looks for the 'position' occupied by the army. Peasant militia digging entrenchments
Pevear and Volokhonsky: Pierre leaves Mozhaisk for Borodino. Meets a convoy of wounded.

Translation:

XX.

On the morning of the 25th Pierre left from Mozhayck. In the descent from the great steep and crooked mountains, leading from the cities, standing past the mountain to the right cathedral, in which went a service and preaching, Pierre got out from the crew and went by foot. Behind him lowered on the mountain some horse regiment with singers ahead. Towards him lifted train carts with the wounded in yesterday’s case. Carts of men, shouting at the horses and whipping their whips, ran across from one party to another. Carts, on which were lying and sitting three and four soldiers wounded, jumped by the outline on the seen pavement of stones on a cool lift. The wounded, tied with rags, pale, with tightened lips and frowning eyebrows, held behind beds, jumped and jostled on carts. Almost all with naive childhood curiosity looked at the white hat and green tailcoat of Pierre.

The coachman of Pierre angrily shouted at the wagon of wounded, for them to hold to one side. The cavalry regiment with songs, going down from the mountains, moved forward to the carriage of Pierre and hindered the road. Pierre had stopped, huddled to the edge of the dug up in the mountain roads, from behind the slope of the mountains the sun had not gotten in the deepening of the roads, and here it was cold and damp; above the head of Pierre was the bright August morning, and the funny spreading ringing. One of the supplied with wounded stopped at the edge of the road beside Pierre himself. The carter in bast shoes, out of breath, ran up to their cart, slipped a rock under the rear, not shimming the wheels and began to straighten his helmet on his coming horse.

One wounded old soldier with a tied hand, going behind the cart, took for his healthy hand and turned back to Pierre.

— What the same, countryman, whether they will place us here? Or to Moscow? — he said.

Pierre so thought that he did not hear the issue. He watched on that cavalry regiment, met now with the train of wounded that was on that cart, at which he stood and on which were sitting two wounded and one lying. One of the sitting on the cart soldiers was probably injured in the cheek. All his head was tied with rags, and only his cheek was swollen from his childish head. His mouth and nose were on the side. This soldier saw the cathedral and crossed. Another, a young boy, a recruit, blond and white, as would be completely without blood on his thin face, with a stopping good smile watched Pierre; the third lied face down, and his face was not seen. The cavalry singers passed above the cart itself.

— Ah disappeared... Yes a keen head...

— Yes on the foreign side of life... — they made a dancing soldier song. As would be echoing them, but in another kind of fun, interrupted in the above metal sounds of ringing. And, still in another kind of fun, doused the top opposite slope of the hot rays of the sun. Yet below the slope, in the carts with the wounded, beside the breathless horse, at which stood Pierre, it was damp, mainly cloudy and sad.

The soldier with the swollen cheek angrily looked at the singing cavalrymen.

— Oh, dandies! — he spoke reproachfully.

— Now not that, soldier, but little men have seen! Those little men drive, — said with a sad smile the soldier standing behind the cart and turning to Pierre. — Now not disassembled... to all people who are piled up want, in one word — Moscow. One end we do not want. — despite the indefiniteness of the words of the soldier, Pierre got all that what he wanted to say, and approvingly nodded his head.

The road cleared, and Pierre came down under the mountain and went farther.

Pierre rode, looking back by both parts of the roads, looking for acquaintances in the faces and everywhere meeting only unfamiliar, military faces of different families of troops, equally with surprise watched his white hat and green tailcoat.

Driving four versts, he met the first friend and happily turned to him. This familiar was one of the chief doctors in the army. He in a chaise rode towards Pierre, sitting nearby with a young doctor and, upon learning of Pierre, stopped his Cossack, sitting on the box instead of a coachman.

— Count! Your excellency, how are you here? — asked the doctor.

— Yes, here wanted to look...

— Yes, yes, I will look...

Pierre tore and, stopping, got into conversation with the doctor, explaining to him his intention to participate in the battle.

The doctor advised Bezuhov to turn to all the lordly.

— What the same, God knows, where to find you in the time of the battle, and the obscurity, — he said, exchanging glances with his young friend, — But the lordly all the same knows you and will accept you graciously. So, father, do it, — said the doctor.

The doctor seemed tired and in a hurry.

— So you think... but I still wanted to ask you, where the same is the position itself? — said Pierre.

— The position? — said the doctor, — Really this is not my part. You will pass Tatarinov, there many are digging something. There on the mound enter: from there it is seen, — said the doctor.

— And it is seen from there?.. If you would...

Yet the doctor interrupted him and moved to the chaise.

— I would spend you, and God — here (doctor showed his throat) — jumps to the corps commander. Because how are we?.. You know, count, tomorrow is the battle; in one hundred thousand troops, a little number of 20 thousand wounded are needed to be counted; but we have stretchers, beds, paramedics, or doctors for not six thousand. There are 10 thousand carts, and because we need others; as we want, we make.

That strange idea that of the numbers of those thousand people alive, healthy, young and old, which with fun surprise looked at his hat, there was for sure 20 thousand doomed to wounds and death (maybe, those very ones which he saw) — struck Pierre.

"They, maybe, die tomorrow, what for do they think about something other, besides death?" And to him suddenly by some secret communication of thoughts lively presented the descent from the Mozhayck mountains, the carts with the wounded, ringing, oblique rays of the sun and the song of the cavalrymen.

"The cavalry go into battle and meet the wounded, and for one moment do not think above that what awaits them, but go past and wink at the wounded. But of all these are 20 thousand doomed to death, but they are amazed at my hat! Weird!" thought Pierre, directed farther to Tatarinov.

At the landlord’s home, on the left side of the road, were standing crews, vans, crowd orderlies and sentries. Here stood the lordly. Yet at that time, as Pierre had arrived, he was not, and almost nobody was from the staff. All were at the prayer. Pierre went forward to Gorky.

Entering on the mountain and leaving to the small street of the village, Pierre saw for the first time the peasant militias with crosses on their hats and on the whites of the shirts, which, with loud speaking and laughter, lively and sweaty, worked on something to the right from the roads, to the huge mound, overgrown with grass.

One of them dug with shovels in the mountain, another raised with boards the earth to wheelbarrows, the third were standing, doing nothing.

Two officers were standing on the mound, disposing of them. Seeing these peasants, still obviously amused at his new military position, Pierre again remembered the wounded soldiers at Mozhayck, and he began to understand that what the soldier wanted to express, speaking about what all people wanted to pile on. The view of these workings on the field of battle, the bearded peasants with their strange awkward boots, with their sweaty necks and some in oblique unbuttoned shirts, from below were seen tanned clavicle bones, acted on Pierre stronger only what he saw and heard before still about the solemnity and significance of the present minutes.

Time: the 25th of August
Mentioned: to-day, to-morrow

Locations: Mozhaysk (also Mozhaysk hill), Gorki (Gorky in Dunnigan, Bell, and Garnett.)
Mentioned: Moscow, Tatarinovo (Tartarinova in Maude, Mandelker, and Briggs.)

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: We go back to Pierre after the military history expository chapter, as now we are on the 25th, with Borodino looming on the 26th. He sees the results of the previous day's fighting. He speaks to a doctor who advises him where to go.
The doctor says "tomorrow's the battle: for a hundred thousand troops we must figure on at least twenty thousand wounded; and we don't have enough stretchers, or beds, or medics, or doctors for even six thousand."
Pierre: "twenty thousand of them are doomed to die, yet they get surprised at my hat!"
Pierre then realizes the meaning of what the soldier had told him earlier in the chapter. The peasants are expected to carry the burden of the war effort.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Count Pierre Bezukhoi (also "batyushka")

Yevstafyevitch ("Pierre's coachman." As in Chapter 205, you could argue this coachman/driver is different than the head coachman Yevstafyevitch.)

Kutuzof ("serene highness".)

(of course many soldiers, including: cavalry singers, peasants drivers of the telyegas, the teamster and his little patient horse, an old soldier with an arm in a sling, the wounded soldier with the swollen cheek as big as a child, a young raw recruit, and a third with his face hidden. The peasants are also mentioned in general. Also the physician to the staff that is an acquaintance to Pierre. He is accompanied by a young doctor and a Cossack. He mentions someone who is called to a corps commander. Pierre also sees the peasant-landwehr, two officers, and other peasants.)

Abridged Versions:
Gibian: Chapter 20.
Fuller: Only the first sentence, which tells us that Pierre drove out Mozhaisk on the 25th is kept.
Komroff: The conversation a soldier tries to have with Pierre is removed and we get to the wounded soldier with the swollen cheek as big as a baby's head quicker. The singing is also removed. The conversation with the doctor is much shorter and Pierre only has the realization that many of those who he is looking at will die, not the other realization about the peasants bearing the brunt of the war.
Kropotkin: Chapter is severely shortened, maintaining just the basics of Pierre seeing the wounded soldiers and knowing that many of them will die. This removes his conversation with the wounded soldiers and the doctor character entirely. No break.
Bromfield: The doctor is the one that makes the Burdino/Borodino confusion rather than the soldier in the next chapter of the latter version. We don't have Pierre's realizations or the wounded soldiers here.
Simmons: Chapter 20: While the conversation with the doctor is preserved almost completely, there, some of the overall description of the chapter is cut.

Additional Notes:

Davidov/Troubetzkoy: Page 163: "I feel, in a sense, that I was born solely to play a role in the fateful year of 1812; but much in the same manner as a rank and file soldier firing blindly amid the smoke and confusion of the battle of Borodino, I have killed a dozen Frenchmen. No matter how much knowledge and talent were at my disposal, it was fate, just the same, which decided to diminish the enemy army by a dozen men and thereby to contribute to its eventual destruction by my comrades."

Speirs: Page 43: "The five books (IX-XIII) which now follow are divided into two sections, the first consisting of two books and the second of three, precisely as with the previous five books. The conclusion of the first of these sections (comprising Books Nine and Ten) is to be the Battle of Borodino. There is now a distinct change in emphasis....People now move in their masses, in entire nations. A consequence of this is that the author, the organiser of the material, is far more in evidence. Tolstoy drops the role of an impersonal narrator concealed behind his characters. He now uses his private voice and stands in the foreground, selecting and guiding...He is now there as a man who is searching for answers…”

My Religion: "With despair in their hearts they move on, to die of hunger, or cold, or disease, or, if they survive, to be brought within range of a storm of bullets and commanded to kill. They kill and are killed, none of them knows why or to what end. An ambitious stripling has only to brandish his sword and shout a few magniloquent words to induce them to rush to certain death. And yet no one finds this to be difficult."

Chapter 10 of The Kingdom of God is Within You: The Power of Public Opinion

Chapter 10: EVIL CANNOT BE SUPPRESSED BY THE PHYSICAL FORCE OF THE GOVERNMENT—THE MORAL PROGRESS OF HUMANITY IS BROUGHT ABOUT NOT ONLY BY INDIVIDUAL RECOGNITION OF TRUTH, BUT ALSO THROUGH THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A PUBLIC OPINION.

In this chapter Tolstoy again discusses the "true meaning" of Christianity, its relationship with politics, and how change could and should happen for those driven by those of the new moral conception. 

Christianity in its true meaning destroys the state. Thus it was understood from the very beginning, and Christ was crucified for this very reason, and thus it has always been understood by men who are not fettered by the necessity of proving the justification of the Christian state.

Of course, reformers will argue that it is possible to improve the state and that the state is what brings progress to humanity. But this is to clearly misunderstand the teaching of Jesus, who did not want to bring about a new government or overthrow the Romans ("render unto Caesar", etc.) but worked to bring humanity to live in a new way without church authorities or recognition of the god-like power of the government.

Some men say that the state is most necessary for humanity, that the destruction of the political form would lead to the destruction of everything worked out by humanity, that the state has been and continues to be the only form of the development of humanity, and that all that evil which we see among the nations who live in the political form is not due to this form, but to the abuses, which can be mended without destruction, and that humanity, without impairing the political form, can develop and reach a high degree of well-being.

At the end of the day, whether one thinks Tolstoy's teachings have something to say for the modern day revolutionary relies less, in my opinion, on whether one accepts his beliefs on Jesus's teachings and "true Christianity" than from where change and progress comes from. Does it come from the work of public funding (government), private "geniuses", the masses in general, or something else.

It is impossible to prove, as the defenders of the state claim, that the destruction of the state will lead to a social chaos, mutual rapine, murder, and the destruction of all public institutions, and the return of humanity to barbarism; nor can it be proved, as the opponents of the state claim, that men have already become so wise and good that they do not rob or kill one another, that they prefer peace to hostility, that they will themselves without the aid of the state arrange everything they need, and that therefore the state not only does not contribute to all this, but, on the contrary, under the guise of defending men, exerts a harmful and bestializing influence upon them. It is impossible to prove either the one or the other by means of abstract reflections.

The problem is that abstract reasoning cannot prove anything about humanity, putting Tolstoy clearly in the camp of the empiricists in the classic empiricist/rationalist enlightenment debate (Tolstoy probably owes a lot of his epistemological thought, as much as he has epistemological thought, to Kant and proto/early-existentialist critiques of Kant) and while using empirical data rather than abstract reasoning to establish political thinking probably sounds obvious to us, it wasn't always so and even for Tolstoy and his anti-scientific views, isn't exactly obvious for him. The most interesting part of the passage is not Tolstoy's claim that defenders of the state have no evidence for their claims that the removal of the state would lead to anarchy, chaos, and violence, but his distancing himself from the anarchists, who through reasoning claim that men is essentially good and the institutions make them bad (cf. Rousseau). So how do people decide whether the state is necessary if they cannot do so through abstract reasoning or "science"?

No matter what arguments men may adduce in proof of the danger of abolishing the power of the state and that this abolition may beget calamities, the men who have outgrown the political form can no longer find their place in it. And, no matter what arguments may be adduced to a man who has outgrown the political form, about its indispensableness, he cannot return to it, cannot take part in the affairs which are denied by his consciousness, just as the full-grown chicks can no longer return into the shell which they have outgrown.

The answer does not lie in argumentation and isn't something that can be proved or disproved. Rather, Tolstoy uses a natural analogy to show the development of human consciousness being unrational. Once humanity, or certain humans, have developed or evolved past the point of our current political structure, then just as humanity, or an intellectual subset of humanity, grows past believing in miracles and all arguments about miracles becoming superfluous or meaningless, arguments about maintaining the political structure become superfluous and meaningless. This actually has, I think, a very palpable application to today's political climate in which a lot of the debate seems to be about the efficacy of debate and whether or not even hateful voices should be allowed to the table. For Tolstoy, it would seem that debate is meaningless, not necessarily because rational discussions are less powerful than emotional ones as in some conceptions, but because the moral consciousness of a person and humanity in general is what drives change, not convincing people that certain systems or policies are good or bad. Of course, Tolstoy isn't above using arguments, as below:

In saying that without the power of state the evil men would rule over the good, they take it for granted that the good are precisely those who at the present time have power, and the bad the same who are now subjugated. But it is precisely this that has to be proved. This would be true only if in our world took place what really does not take place, but is supposed to take place, in China, namely, that the good are always in power, and that, as soon as at the helm of the government stand men who are not better than those over whom they rule, the citizens are obliged to depose them. Thus it is supposed to be in China, but in reality this is not so, and cannot be so, because, in order to overthrow the power of the violating government, it is not enough to have the right to do so

The burden of proof is something that will be talked about later on, but, as Tolstoy states, there is no good reason to think that the people who rule are the good people and the ones that are in prisons, camps, or destitute are the bad people. Tolstoy also holds up China several times in his work as a moderately progressive, or at least peaceful government, which seems alienating to us considering the Western view of Chinese empire and the colorization of this view with Maoist and post-Maoist China, though at the publishing time of this work, the emperor would soon introduce reforms so radical that the ruling class put him in house arrest and China was on a power decline that had it constantly on the defensive. The last sentence of the above quote ties into the quote below, which is another claim against revolutionaries and those who want to change the hands of power.

In order to get the power and retain it, it is necessary to love power; but love of power is not connected with goodness, but with qualities which are the opposite of goodness, such as pride, cunning, cruelty.

Just as Napoleon has to reject everything human and good in order to invade Russia or gain and maintain his power in War and Peace, rulers or those who wish to rule have to reject morality and goodness to do so because they are diametrically opposed. Interestingly, this is an acceptance of the Nietzschean dichotomy of master and slave morality, but with Tolstoy taking the other side of it by arguing that "slave morality" is the correct morality because the advancement of moral consciousness has not favored the so-called "superman" but has instead rejected this morality for the one of Jesus's Sermon on the Mount. This is why Nietzsche is reactionary while Tolstoy has a moral progressiveness to his teaching while Nietzsche tries to drag humanity backwards to its pre-Christian roots (notice that for both, the arrival of Jesus and his teachings marked an essential moment in the history of moral thought).

in the transference of the power in one state from one set of persons to another, has the power always passed into the hands of those who were better? When Louis XVI. was deposed, and Robespierre and later Napoleon ruled, who did rule? Better or worse men? And when did better men rule, when men from Versailles or from the Commune were in power? or when Charles I. or Cromwell was at the head of the government? or when Peter III was Tsar or when he was killed, and the sovereign was Catherine for one part of Russia and Pugachev for the other? Who was then evil and who good?

The passage is most interesting not for its general argument, which we have seen already, but for the concrete examples that Tolstoy uses. The movement from Louis XVI to Robespierre to Napoleon has been written about perhaps as much as any transfer of power in human history and the meaning of this movement plays a role in the way Pierre perceives the world and his actions in War and Peace. Was one better than the other? Was it necessary? Does it mean anything? Around twenty years later, Tolstoy is still discussing these questions in The Kingdom of God is Within You. Without rehashing the whole of the French Revolution leading up to Napoleon here, we can comment on how the history of France from about 1780 to 1880 is a rather good example of how political upheavals, reforms, revolutions, and reactions lead to different rulers and forms of government but not necessarily a reduction of violence (at times obviously increasing violence) or increase in quality of life or freedom. More interesting from a Russian perspective is the move from Peter III to her husband Catherine the Great, whom Tolstoy considered a butcher and tyrant and the nostalgic call backs to her in War and Peace are best to be read as heavily ironic. The characterization of Pugachev ruling part of Russia is interesting. As J. Christopher Herold writes in The Age of Napoleon (Page 346): “Emelyan Pugachev, an illiterate Cossack, waged against Catherine the Great in 1773-75...At least fifteen hundred of the gentry class were massacred by Pugachev’s bands before Catherine’s soldiers suppressed the uprising with equal brutality. The result of the rebellion was the still further enslavement of the peasants."

According to Christ's teaching the good are those who humble themselves, suffer, do not resist evil with force, forgive offences, love their enemies; the evil are those who exalt themselves, rule, struggle, and do violence to people, and so, according to Christ's teaching, there is no doubt as to where the good are among the ruling and the subjugated. It even sounds ridiculous to speak of ruling Christians.

Jesus's teachings speak against the grabbing of power and thus, those who are ruling are always in the wrong because they are the ones that are ruling and to become rulers or to grab power, as the slimy movement of society and military command in War and Peace shows, one must become immoral and refuse to humble oneself.

it has always been since the beginning of the world, and thus it is now. The bad always rule over the good and always do violence to them. Cain did violence to Abel, cunning Jacob to trustful Esau, deceitful Laban to Jacob; Caiaphas and Pilate ruled over Christ, the Roman emperors ruled over a Seneca, an Epictetus, and good Romans who lived in their time. John IV. with his oprfchniks, the drunken syphilitic Peter with his fools, the harlot Catherine with her lovers, ruled over the industrious religious Russians of their time and did violence to them. William rules over the Germans, Stambulov over the Bulgarians, Russian officials over the Russian people.

That the violent and "bad" always are the ones to come to power is demonstrated for Tolstoy by Old Testament teaching (which he does not utilize often), the killing of Jesus by the Romans (Tolstoy rejecting the Biblical narrative that the Jews killed Jesus for the more historically accurate idea that Jesus was a victim of Roman Imperialism), and then through Russian history. As Peter the Great is associated with the conservative propagandist Rostopchin in War and Peace, Tolstoy takes the lowest possible view of the Tsars of Russian history. He also sees how the burgeoning bureaucracy of his time (as discussed in Anna Karenina and sarcastically hinted at in War and Peace) only took the place of or supplemented the tyrannical Tsars rather than supplanting them with a less violent system. He also spends quite a bit of time discussing William I of Germany and how he often said the things aloud that the other rulers believed quietly. Most important to understand is that for Tolstoy, politics is violence and it is always the worst person, the "bad", that becomes the leader over the rest, the "good". This of course rejects all hope for social democracy, for reformers of the system, and should make us deeply suspicious of governments claiming to act in ways to stop violence.

Comically striking in this respect is the naive assertion of the Russian authorities in doing violence to other nationalities, the Poles, Baltic Germans, Jews. The Russian government practises extortion on its subjects, for centuries has not troubled itself about the Little Russians in Poland, nor about the Letts in the Baltic provinces, nor about the Russian peasants who have been exploited by all manner of men, and suddenly it becomes a defender of the oppressed against the oppressors, those very oppressors whom it oppresses.

This is a big part of the final book of Anna Karenina, in which the nationalists believe they are going to war to help the Slavs, while Levin, the Tolstoy stand-in, is skeptical of their motivation (they just want to go to war) and of the efficacy of doing so (how will violence stop the violence?). Oppressive governments, other than those like William or outright fascist governments that revel in their violence and do not hide what they mean, often use language that situates themselves as liberators of the oppressed in order to wage war and cause violence. The parallels of our recent history in America are so obvious that they do not need to be stated. Starting with Tolstoy's premise that the bad always triumph over the good in politics helps us see through these naked attempts more clearly in order to see the outright lies, or at least misdirections and misleading statements, of governments using violence to "help" oppressed people.

When the violence of the government is destroyed, acts of violence will, probably, be committed by other men than before; but the sum of the violence will in no case be increased, simply because the power will pass from the hands of one set of men into those of another.

Tolstoy admits that violence, and different violence, will happen with the destruction of the government (Tolstoy's use of "destroyed" is interesting since the government shouldn't be overthrown in Tolstoy's conception, but simply withdrawn from, thus losing its power), and for some (perhaps the majority) this is enough to argue for the maintaining and support of the government. For Tolstoy, this is a trade off that is worth it because power will change hands, causing a massive shift in society, though this line of thinking seems similar to the justifications given by violent revolutionaries, which is why the next passage is important.

Alexander I., having recognized all the vanity and evil of power, renounced it, because they saw all its evil and were no longer able calmly to make use of violence as of a good deed, as they had done before.

This is of course not the only time in his work that Tolstoy endorses the Feodor Kuzmich theory and I think it is important to consider the ramifications of believing in the conspiracy for Tolstoy's portrayal of Alexander, in both his political theory and, most important for us, in War and Peace.  In most conceptions and interpretations of Alexander, he is understood to have started with liberal minded ideas only to betray these ideas and give up the ideas of reforms (jettisoning Czartoryski for Speransky and then for Arakcheev) and spend the post-war portion of his reign as a religious reactionary tyrant. There are some conceptions of Alexander in this vein in War and Peace, especially in Pierre's diagnosis at the end of the novel (but Arakcheev for instance is seen as a wing of the government that all governments have, just like Davoust for Napoleon), but unlike Napoleon, who is portrayed as ridiculous and comic in many sections of the novel, Alexander's portrayal can actually be considered quite positive. Obviously this is helped in that nearly every character in the novel has immense respect for the Tsar and so very few things are said negatively about him, but Tolstoy has very little to add negatively about him (the episode with Kutuzov at Austerlitz stands out as a negative moment for Alexander) other than emphasizing that he is not the one who controlled history and did not plan to trap the French in the Russian winter. While we have seen Tolstoy critique Nicholas earlier in the book and Peter the Great (as well as Peter III) and Catherine the Great in this chapter, we don't see him takes shots at Alexander. And I think this is because believing in the Feodor Kuzmich conspiracy theory makes Alexander the ideal ruler according to Tolstoy. He is the one that realizes the emptiness of reforms and that humanity cannot be helped from the top down and that the only way to live a religious life is to leave political and societal life. Rejection, not reform, is what Alexander, if one believes the Feodor Kuzmich conspiracy theory, realized the Christian life necessitated (of course, endorsing conspiracy theories in your work that rejects Christian miracles for being something the modern human cannot believe and attempts to ask humanity to live in a more progressive way can certainly seem to be a contradiction).

Men who have attained power and wealth, frequently the very men who have gained them, more frequently their descendants, stop being so anxious for power and so cruel in attaining it.

This is of course extremely optimistic and one can look at our world and argue that this is untrue, with the descendants of major political, religious, or business empires seem to be even more cruel than their parents (many names that we do not need to list quickly come to mind), so on an empirical level, at least in our day, this seems to fail. On a rational level however, one could see that this could work, with the parents working so hard to procure and protect the wealth and status that they are ruthless and immoral, while the kids, because they inherit this wealth and status, feel no need to step on others. However, this seems to fail to consider that those who inherit it see no other way to live and their fighting and oppression of others is just seen as a natural attempt at preserving the only way of life they know. But more importantly, Tolstoy lays out how moral progress happens.

The transition of men from one structure of life to another does not always take place in the manner in which the sand is poured out from an hour-glass, — one kernel of sand after another, from the first to the last, — but rather like water pouring into a vessel that is immerged in the water, when it at first admits the water evenly and slowly at one side, and then, from the weight of the water already taken in, suddenly dips down fast and almost all at once receives all the water which it can hold.

Progress does not necessarily happen in slow drips or slow constant turns of the wheel, but may pause for a while, drip, and then flood. Change is not slow progress where moral and societal improvements happen from generation to generation but instead can happen all at once or rather drastically in a very brief amount of time. This is because of the follow-the-leader (almost herd-like to bring up Nietzsche again) attitude of progress that Tolstoy adopts. 

Every new truth, which changes the composition of human life and moves humanity forward, is at first accepted by only a very small number of men, who understand it in an internal way. The rest, who out of confidence had accepted the previous truth, on which the existing order is based, always oppose the dissemination of the new truth. But since, in the first place, men do not stand still, but incessantly move forward, comprehending the truth more and more, and approaching it with their lives, and, in the second place, all of them, through their age, education, and race, are predisposed to a gradation of men, from those who are most capable to comprehend...then more and more frequently, pass over to the side of the new truth, and the number of men who recognize the new truth grows larger and larger, and the truth grows all the time more and more comprehensible.

This is an interesting, and certainly not altogether wrong, interpretation of how truth is accepted in society. First, it is seen as eccentric and only accepted by a small, radical group while opposed by the majority of society. However, it then continues to grow, because humanity does not stand still. For Tolstoy, humanity doesn't stay still, because just as in War and Peace, humanity is pushed by a force they cannot comprehend. So, at first, a truth, such as the teaching of Jesus, is only taken in by a small group, such as disciples, but then it grows, like the mustard seed, and becomes more universally accepted. Interestingly, communism can be seen as going in the same path, even undergoing what Christianity went through, which is corruption, that once it was accepted by a larger group of people, it was changed into something else entirely, and then rejected by the majority of thinking people (just like Christianity). 

public opinion to arise and be diffused does not need hundreds and thousands of years, and has the property of acting infectiously upon people and with great rapidity embracing large numbers of men.

Just as the goal of art is to "infect" the consumer with the artist's intent, truth has a nature that spreads like a virus or the plague, first infecting a few, then spreading to society at large and doing so quickly. This is why writing, proselytizing, evangelizing, or whatever you would like to call it, is important. While passivity is the correct political and societal action, moral teaching is still vitally important because it is through this the floodgates of moral change occurs. Public opinion must be swayed and the masses must move in a general direction for their to be change.

The men in power are convinced that it is only violence that moves and guides men, and so they boldly use violence for the maintenance of the present order of things. But the existing order is not maintained through violence, but through public opinion, the effect of which is impaired by violence.

This is an interesting argument, but one that is consistent with Tolstoy's argument that moral and societal change cannot come through violence because it then becomes about that violence, which rebuts revolutionists. What this argument of course begins to do, however, is argue that the state-driven violence that is used to maintain the social order and oppress freedom is, in fact, ineffective.

Nations have never subjugated other nations by violence alone. If a nation which subjugated another stood on a lower stage of development, there was always repeated the phenomenon that it did not introduce its structure of life by means of violence, but, on the contrary, always submitted to the structure of life which existed in the conquered nation. If a nation, crushed by force, is subjugated or close to subjugation, it is so only through public opinion, and by no means through violence, which, on the contrary, provokes the nation more and more.

The immediate emotional reaction or problem that this argument can provoke in a reader is that this sounds somewhat like victim blaming, that the colonized are not subjugated by the colonizers by violence, but because they want to be colonized. And whether or not this is fair and/or a problem pacifist arguments can sometimes run into in the wrong hands (with the line of thinking that those who act out in violence due to violent circumstances or violence done to them are fully culpable for the consequences that they suffer), Tolstoy does have an interesting observation here, in that influence in colonialism works both ways. The colonized have the culture of the colonizers put onto them while the colonizers simultaneously begin to incorporate (often through coopting or appropriation, though the colonized do the same thing but are rightfully not blamed for it) the culture of the colonized into their own culture. 

The same is true in respect to those savage elements which exist within the societies: it is not the increase nor the decrease of the severity of punishments, nor the change of prisons, nor the increase of the police, that diminish or increase the number of crimes, — it is changed only in consequence of the change in public opinion.

Public opinion and the overall development of humanity's moral consciousness is what causes progressive moral movement. Crime cannot be stopped by wars on crime, just as we have established in our society that terror cannot be stopped through war and drug use cannot be stopped through war on drug use. Societies with harsh punishments against crime do not stop crime or move humanity in a moral way. Instead, they only press crime into the margins or in secret, or oppress those who do not deserve it, causing a moral backwardness that stops moral progression. Despite Tolstoy's ties to deontological ethics, his argument here is a pretty simple one; using jails and police officers to stop crime simply doesn't work and only limits the freedom of people.

We do not know what would happen if no violence were exerted against hostile nations and criminal elements of society. But that the employment of violence at the present time does not subjugate either of them, that we know from protracted experience.

Those who argue that pacifism, the rejection of violence, and the cessation of military or police forces cannot happen or would lead to crime and anarchy act as if they do not have the burden of proof on their hands. Clearly, whether in Tolstoy's time or ours, the building up of military and police forces has not lead to greater freedom, peace, or happiness, so those who continue to argue that these systems must continue or should actually be increased have to show why these systems must continue. They clearly do not work (though our time may be the most peaceful in human history according to some, Tolstoy would argue that this is not because of colonialism, large military budgets, the balance of powers, or even international treaties and diplomacy, but because on the whole, humanity's tolerance for violence has lessened due to an advanced moral consciousness) and there is no reason to think ratcheting them up even further would work, so we should ask why we continue them.

The social structure is such as it is, not thanks to violence, but in spite of it.

And this is an important qualifier and an important statement in regards to Tolstoy's thought on the whole. Our institutions have not changed people or actually changed society. Violence has not been what has worked because, as we have seen above, it does not work. Society is only maintained the way it is because there is a large enough contingent of people that accepts such a society. 

If the life of the individual man, in passing from one age to another, were fully known to him, he would have no reason for living. The same is true of the life of humanity: if it had a programme of the life which awaits it as it enters upon its new age, this would be the surest symptom that it is not living, does not move on, but is whirling about in one spot. The conditions of the new structure of life cannot be known to us, because they have to be worked out by ourselves.

So while Tolstoy's conception of history is basically deterministic, the most important fact about the progression of history is that it is incomprehensible to us. Humanity is being pushed by the will of God to somewhere we cannot know and thus our actions have the upmost consequence and meaning, even though we are currently unaware of where we are heading.