“What am I coming for?" he repeated, looking straight into her eyes. "You know that I have
come to be where you are," he said; "I can't help it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Lord have mercy! Pardon and help us!" he repeated the words that suddenly and
unexpectedly sprang to his lips. And he, an unbeliever, repeated those words not with his lips
only. At that instant he knew that neither his doubts nor the impossibility of believing with his
reason- of which he was conscious- all prevented his appealing to God. It all flew off like dust.
To whom should he appeal, if not to Him in whose hands he felt himself, his soul, and his love,
to be?
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Pure and complete sorrow is as impossible as pure and complete joy.”
―
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
“And then all at once love turns up, and you're done for, done for.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“As is always the case with a thoroughly attractive woman, her defect—the shortness of her
upper lip and her half-open mouth—seemed to be her own special and peculiar form of
beauty.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What is reason given me for, if I am not to use it to avoid bringing unhappy beings into the
world!”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The next Post brought a reply from the starets, who wrote to him that the cause of all his
trouble lay in his pride. His Wrathful Outburst, the starets explained, had come about because
it was not for God that he had humbled himself, rejecting honours and advancement in the
church - not for God, but to satisfy his own pride, to be able to tell himself how virtuous he
was, seeking nothing for self. That was why he had not been able to endure the Superior's
conduct. Because he felt that he had given up everything for God, and now he was being put
on display, like some strange beast.
"If it were for God you had given up advancement, you would have let it pass.
worldly pride is still alive in you.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“In the best, the friendliest and simplest relations flattery or praise is necessary, just as
grease is necessary to keep wheels turning.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He liked fishing and seemed to take pride in being able to like such a stupid occupation.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Talent is the capacity to direct concentrated attention upon the subject: "the gift of seeing
what others have not seen.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A battle is won by him who is firmly resolved to win it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Luxury cannot be obtained other than by enslaving other people.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“For a few seconds they looked silently into each other's eyes, and the distant and
impossible suddenly became near, possible, and inevitable.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I don’t count life as life without love”
―
Leo Tolstoy
