Page:Sarolea - Great Russia.djvu/243

Rh above all, the divine gift of sympathy, which can feel with every suffering, which can read into every heart, into the soul of sinner and saint, of young and old, of the worldling and of the common people. And as we can only inadequately analyse the powers displayed, so we can only dimly guess the methods employed. One of Tolstoy's favourite methods is the method of contrast, and that method is illustrated in the very title of the book. For we may observe that the title is not "The Great War." The title is "War and Peace." The author gives us the action and reaction of the one on the other. He does not give the military events separately. He gives us the battle scenes on the background of the domestic drama. He makes the pomp and circumstance of war alternate with the peaceful pursuits of everyday life. He shows us events, not merely from the vantage-ground of the battlefield, but from the more important point of view of those who are left at home. He tells us of the war as it affects the old prince on his remote estate, or as it impresses the wives and mothers whose dear ones are taken away from them. Whilst in one scene the hero is dying in the stillness of the starry night, in the next