“Yes, there is something uncanny, demonic and fascinating in her.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
Many families remain for years in the same place, though both husband and wife are sick of
it, simply because there is neither complete division nor agreement between them.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The more mental effort he made the clearer he saw that it was undoubtedly so: that he had
really forgotten and overlooked one little circumstance in life - that Death would come and end
everything, so that it was useless to begin anything, and that there was no help for it, Yes it
was terrible but true”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If so many men, so many minds, certainly so many hearts, so many kinds of love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And indeed, if Evgeny Irtenev was mentally ill, then all people are just as mentally ill, and
the most mentally ill are undoubtably those who see signs of madness in others that they do
not see in themselves.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Her motherly instinct told her that there was too much of something in Natasha, and that it
would prevent her from being happy.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Yes, love, ...but not the love that loves for something, to gain something, or because of
something, but that love that I felt for the first time, when dying, I saw my enemy and yet loved
him. I knew that feeling of love which is the essence of the soul, for which no object is needed.
And I know that blissful feeling now too. To love one's neighbours; to love one's enemies. To
love everything - to Love God in all His manifestations. Some one dear to one can be loved
with human love; but an enemy can only be loved with divine love. And that was why I felt
such joy when I felt that I loved that man. What happened to him? Is he alive? ...Loving with
human love, one may pass from love to hatred; but divine love cannot change. Nothing, not
even death, can shatter it. It is the very nature of the soul. And how many people I have hated
in my life. And of all people none I have loved and hated more than her.... If it were only
possible for me to see her once more... once, looking into those eyes to say...”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I don't give a damn unless I'm fond of a person;but I'd sacrifice my life for those I am fond
of; the rest I'd throttle if they stood in my way...And you may not believe me but if I still set a
value on life it is only because I still hope one day to meet such a heavenly creature who will
regenarate me, purify me and elevate me. But you don't understand that.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I think that in order to know love one must make a mistake and then correct it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“All this was clear to me, and I was glad and at peace. Then it is as if someone is saying to
me, "See that you remember." And I awoke.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Art is not a handicraft; it is the transmission of feeling the artist has experienced.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Life did not stop, and one had to live.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“at one time, a freethinker was a man who had been brought up in the conceptions of
religion, law and morality, who reached freethought only after conflict and difficulty. But now a
new type of born freethinkers has appeared, who grow up without so much as hearing that
there used to be laws of morality, or religion, that authorities existed... In the old days, you
see, if a man - a Frenchman, for instance- wished to get an education, he would have set to
work to study the classics, the theologians, the tragedians, historians and philosophers- and
you can realize all the intellectual labour involved. But nowadays he goes straight for the
literature of negation, rapidly assimilates the essence of the science of negation, and thinks
he's finished.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“But the law of loving others could not be discovered by reason, because it is unreasonable.”
―
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
