- Levin continues to question the meaning of life, and he spends time rereading all the men who might help him: Plato, Spinoza, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, and Schopenhaur.
- Levin can understand and accept these authors' arguments, but only if he disregards real life and real experiences.
- Throughout the entire spring, Levin believes that he cannot live without answering these questions: who am I? Why am I here?
- He is briefly entranced by the teachings of the Church, but after reading the histories of two churches—the Eastern Orthodox and the Catholic—he sees that each one shares many teachings with the other, but that both reject the other entirely. So he cannot sustain his belief in either one.
- These questions so absorb Levin that he is convinced he will either hang or shoot himself. But he doesn't. He goes on living.