But the conquest of fear was what fascinated them.

The continual ecstasy of vanquishing and the consciousness that no one could vanquish them was what attracted them.
The same L---n struggled with hunger for some time before he was sent into exile, and toiled to earn his daily bread simply because he did not care to comply with the requests of his rich father, which he considered unjust.

So his conception of struggle was many-sided, and he did not prize stoicism and strength of character only in duels and bear-fights.
But many years have passed since those times, and the nervous, exhausted, complex character of the men of to-day is incompatible with the craving for those direct and unmixed sensations which were so sought after by some restlessly active gentlemen of the good old days.

Nikolay Vsyevolodovitch would, perhaps, have looked down on L--n, and have called him a boastful cock-a-hoop coward; it's true he wouldn't have expressed himself aloud.

Stavrogin would have shot his opponent in a duel, and would have faced a bear if necessary, and would have defended himself from a brigand in the forest as successfully and as fearlessly as L--n, but it would be without the slightest thrill of enjoyment, languidly, listlessly, even with ennui and entirely from unpleasant necessity.