- We get some more of Pierre’s diary. And let us tell you, it’s a doozy.
- Things we learn:
- Pierre tries to pray and read the Bible every day.
- He’s trying his best to overcome vanity, lust, and anger.
- Pierre has nominated Boris to be a Freemason, and Boris has gone through the initiation ceremony. Pierre clearly doesn’t think Boris believes any of their stuff – he just wants to be there for the big names.
- As Tolstoy writes about it, Freemasonry seems to consist of a lot of pseudo chemistry and wacky science. (They're rather obsessed with the elements.)
- Pierre gets snappy at Boris one day, and that night he has a dream about being attacked by dogs who cling to him. Pierre thinks the dogs are his passions that he can’t quite control. Um, OK.
- Pierre then has another dream about his main Masonic mentor. It’s kind of a sexy dream, we have to say. Lots of holding each other on beds while Iosif Alexeevich tells Pierre that he needs to start having sex with his wife. You know, as a duty.
- And then yet another sexy dream about a girl in transparent clothes floating to the sky. Pierre interprets this dream as the adventures of a soul going to meet God, Song of Songs-style. (Song of Songs is a book in the Old Testament, also sometimes called the Song of Solomon, because in theory he wrote it. It’s a long erotic poem, a lover singing to and about his beloved and her awesome body and personality. It’s a little hard to know what to make of this thing smack in the middle of the Bible, so sometimes it’s interpreted as a metaphor for the relationship between a soul and God.)