Justice in the negative sense

At the hut Veslovsky is being pulled out of his slime-covered boots by a soldier and reporting that the peasants fed him, gave him vodka, and would take no money. In the hay-barn afterwards Oblonsky describes shooting with the railway magnate Malthus — preserved marshes, dog-carts, a marquee for lunch — and Levin asks how such people fail to disgust him: every acquisition out of proportion to the toil contributed is dishonourable. Oblonsky answers that Levin's five thousand from the estate beside the peasant host's fifty is the same case, and that the hostility toward such men is envy. Levin concedes the injustice and will not give the land away — he has duties to it and to his family — and says he acts justly only in a negative sense, by not increasing the inequality; both men call it sophistry. Veslovsky goes off after singing maid-servants and returns delighted with a perfect Gretchen. Oblonsky warns Levin he is not manly enough with his wife. Levin lies awake asking whether one can only act justly in a negative sense.

Levin is put in the wrong by two men he does not respect and cannot answer them, which Tolstoy leaves standing: the negative justice he claims is a half-measure and he knows it. Oblonsky's doctrine — guard the sanctity of the home and do not tie your hands — is stated plainly for the first time. The boy asking what the dogs will catch is the last, unanswerable voice.