“I have learned what must be, and therefore have come to see the whole horror of what is.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is
not gold.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Why is gambling forbidden while women in costumes which evoke sensuality are not
forbidden? They are a thousand times more dangerous!”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“You can love a person dear to you with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with
divine love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If you look for perfection, you will never be satisfied.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The true meaning of Christ's teaching consists in the recognition of love as the supreme
law of life, and therefore not admitting any exceptions.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Error is the force that welds men together; truth is communicated to men only by deeds of
truth.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If there was a reason why he preferred the liberal tendency to the conservative one (also
held to by many of his circle), it was not because he found the liberal tendency more sensible,
but it more closely suited his manner of life.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A man of the present day, whether he believes in the divinity of Christ or not, cannot fail to
see that to assist in the capacity of tzar, minister, governor, or commissioner in taking from a
poor family its last cow for taxes to be spent on cannons, or on the pay and pensions of idle
officials, who live in luxury and are worse than useless; or in putting into prison some man we
have ourselves corrupted, and throwing his family on the streets; or in plundering and
butchering in war; or in inculcating savage and idolatrous superstitious in the place of the lawof Christ; or in impounding the cow found on one's land, though it belongs to a man who has
no land; or to cheat the workman in a factory, by imposing fines for accidentally spoiled
articles; or making a poor man pay double the value for anything simply because he is in the
direst poverty;--not a man of the present day can fail to know that all these actions are base
and disgraceful, and that they need not do them. They all know it. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Yes, there is something uncanny, demonic and fascinating in her.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it,
everything belongs. If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know
himself.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A monkey was carrying two handfuls of peas. One little pea dropped out. He tried to pick it
up, and split twenty. He tried to pick up the twenty, and split them all. Then he lost his temper,
scattered the peas in all directions and ran away”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The social conditions of life can only be improved by people exercising self-restraint.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“But every acquisition that is disproportionate to the labor spent on it is dishonest.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
