The satisfaction of one’s needs⁠—good food, cleanliness, and freedom⁠—now that he was deprived of all this, seemed to Pierre to constitute perfect happiness; and the choice of occupation, that is, of his way of life⁠—now that that was so restricted⁠—seemed to him such an easy matter that he forgot that a superfluity of the comforts of life destroys all joy in satisfying one’s needs, while great freedom in the choice of occupation⁠—such freedom as his wealth, his education, and his social position had given him in his own life⁠—is just what makes the choice of occupation insolubly difficult and destroys the desire and possibility of having an occupation.

All Pierre’s daydreams now turned on the time when he would be free. Yet subsequently, and for the rest of his life, he thought and spoke with enthusiasm of that month of captivity, of those irrecoverable, strong, joyful sensations, and chiefly of the complete peace of mind and inner freedom which he experienced only during those weeks.