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"Oh, no, Masha, Konstantin Dmitrievitch said he could not believe

in it," said Kitty, blushing for Levin, and Levin saw this, and,

still more exasperated, would have answered, but Vronsky with his

bright frank smile rushed to the support of the conversation,

which was threatening to become disagreeable.

"You do not admit the conceivability at all?" he queried. "But

why not? We admit the existence of electricity, of which we know

nothing. Why should there not be some new force, still unknown to

us, which...."

"When electricity was discovered," Levin interrupted hurriedly,

"it was only the phenomenon that was discovered, and it was

unknown from what it proceeded and what were its effects, and

ages passed before its applications were conceived. But the

spiritualists have begun with tables writing for them, and

spirits appearing to them, and have only later started saying

that it is an unknown force."