“I think that in order to know love one must make a mistake and then correct it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“We know that man has the faculty of becoming completely absorbed in a subject however
trivial it may be, and that there is no subject so trivial that it will not grow to infinite proportions
if one's entire attention is devoted to it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What are these deaths and revivals? It is clear that I do not live whenever I lose my faith in
the existence of God, and I would have killed myself long ago if I did not have some vague
hope of finding God. I truly live only whenever I am conscious of him and seek him. "What,
then, do I seek?" a voice cried out within me. "He is there, the one without whom there could
be no life." To know God and to liVe come to one and the same thing. God is life.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Her face was brilliant and glowing; but this glow was not one of brightness; it suggested
the fearful glow of a conflagration in the midst of a dark night.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I was wrong when I said that I did not regret the past. I do regret it; I weep for the past love
which can never return. Who is to blame, I do not know. Love remains, but not the old love; its
place remains, but it is all wasted away and has lost all strength and substance; recollections
are still left, and gratitude; but...”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Rostov was not listening to the soldier. He looked at the snowflakes dancing above the fire
and remembered the Russian winter with a warm, bright house, a fluffy fur coat, swift sleighs,
a healthy body, and all the love and care of a family. “And why did I come here?” he
wondered.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Writing laws is easy, but governing is difficult.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“After dinner Natasha went to the clavichord, at Prince Andrey's request, and began
singing. Prince Andrey stood at the window, talking to the ladies, and listened to her. In the
middle of a phrase, Prince Andrey ceased speaking, and felt suddenly a lump in his throat
from tears, the possibility of which he had never dreamed of in himself. He looked at Natasha
singing, and something new and blissful stirred in his soul. He was happy, and at the same
time he was sad. He certainly had nothing to weep about, but he was ready to weep. For
what? For his past love? For the little princess? For his lost illusions? For his hopes for the
future? Yes, and no. The chief thing which made him ready to weep was a sudden, vivid
sense of the fearful contrast between something infinitely great and illimitable existing in him,
and something limited and material, which he himself was, and even she was. This contrast
made his heart ache, and rejoiced him while she was singing.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A battle is won by him who is firmly resolved to win it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“One must try to make one's life as pleasant as possible. I'm alive and it's not my fault,
which means I must somehow go on living the best I can, without bothering anybody, until I
die.'
'But what makes you live? With such thoughts, you'll sit without moving, without undertaking
anything...'
'Life won't leave one alone as it is.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The strongest of all warriors are these two — Time and Patience.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Anna Arkadyevna read and understood, but it was distasteful to her to read, that is, to
follow the reflection of other people’s lives. She had too great a desire to live herself. If she
read that the heroine of the novel was nursing a sick man, she longed to move with noiseless
steps about the room of a sick man; if she read of a member of Parliament making a speech,
she longed to be delivering the speech; if she read of how Lady Mary had ridden after the
hounds, and had provoked her sister-in-law, and had surprised everyone by her boldness, she
too wished to be doing the same. But there was no chance of doing anything; and twisting the
smooth paper knife in her little hands, she forced herself to read.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Ambition was the old dream of his youth and childhood, a dream which he did not confess
even to himself, though it was so strong that now his passion was even doing battle with his
love”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“One must do one of two tings: either admit that the existing order of society is just, and
then stick up for one's rights in it;or acknowledge that you are enjoying unjust privileges, as i
do, and then enjoy them and be satisfied.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
