“But Levin was in love, and so it seemed to him that Kitty was so perfect in every respect
that she was a creature far above everything earthly; and that he was a creature so low and so
earthly that it could not even be conceived that other people and she herself could regard him
as worthy of her.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“We are all brothers, and yet I live by receiving a salary for arraigning, judging and
punishing a thief or a prostitute, whose existence is conditioned by the whole consumption of
my life.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“True religion is that relationship, in accordance with reason and knowledge which man
establishes with the infinite world around him, and which binds his life to that infinity and
guides his actions.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He soon felt that the realization of his desire had given him only a grain of the mountain of
happiness he had expected. It showed him the eternal error people make in imagining that
happiness is the realization of desires.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A man is never such an egoist as at moments of spiritual exaltation, when it seems to him
that there is nothing in the world more splendid and fascinating than himself.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“All were happy -- plants, birds, insects and children. But grown-up people -- adult men and
women -- never left off cheating and tormenting themselves and one another. It was not this
spring morning which they considered sacred and important, not the beauty of God's world,
given to all creatures to enjoy -- a beauty which inclines the heart to peace, to harmony and to
love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If only [people] understood that every thought is both false and true! False by one-
sidenedness resulting from man's inability to embrace the whole truth, and true as an
expression of one fact of human endeavor.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Can it be that I have not lived as one ought?" suddenly came into his head. "But how not
so, when I've done everything as it should be done?”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A good player who loses at chess is genuinely convinced hat he has lost because of a
mistake, and he looks for this mistake in the beginning of his game, but forgets that there were
also mistakes at ever step in the course of the game, that none of his moves was perfect. The
mistake he pays attention to is conspicuous only because his opponent took advantage of it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The study was slowly lit up as the candle was brought in. The familiar details came out: the
stag's horns, the bookshelves, the looking-glass, the stove with its ventilator, which had long
wanted mending, his father's sofa, a large table, on the table an open book, a broken ash-tray,a manuscript-book with his handwriting. As he saw all this, there came over him for an instant
a doubt of the possibility of arranging this new life, of which he had been dreaming on the
road. All these traces of his life seemed to clutch him, and to say to him: 'No, you're not going
to get away from us, and you're not going to be different, but you're going to be the same as
you've always been; with doubts, everlasting dissatisfaction with yourself, vain efforts to
amend, and falls, and everlasting expectations, of a happiness which you won't get, and which
isn't possible for you.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
"Why, whatever loathsome thoughts can you have?" asked Dolly, smiling.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He [Vronsky] himself felt that, except that crazy fellow married to Kitty Shcherbatsky, who,
quite irrelevantly had with rabid virulence told him a lot of pointless nonsense, every nobleman
whose acquaintance he had made had become his partisan.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Neglecting your health can prevent you from serving people, and too much attention to
your body and its health can bring the same results. In order to find the middle way, you
should take care of your body only to the extent that doing so helps you to serve others, and
does not stop you from serving them. No illness can prevent a person from what he has to do.
If you cannot work, then give your love to people. Illnesses of the mind are much more
dangerous than illnesses of the body. —MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“There are many faiths, but the spirit is one — in me, and in you, and in him. So that if
everyone believes himself, all will be united; everyone be himself and all will be as one.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
