“vegetarianism is the taproot of humanitarianism.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The further one goes, the better the land seems. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“When the examination was over, the doctor looked at his watch, and then Praskovya
Fyodorovna informed Ivan Ilyich that it must of course be as he liked, but she had sent today
for a celebrated doctor, and that he would examine him, and have a consultation with Mihail
Danilovich (that was the name of his regular doctor). 'Don't oppose it now, please. This I'm
doing entirely for my own sake,' she said ironically, meaning it to be understood that she was
doing it all for his sake, and was only saying this to give him no right to refuse her request. He
lay silent, knitting his brows. He felt that he was hemmed in by such a tangle of falsity that it
was hard to disentangle anything from it. Everything she did for him was entirely for her own
sake, and she told him she was doing for her own sake what she actually was doing for her
own sake as something so incredible that he would take it as meaning the opposite.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“You're not racing?" joked the officer.
"Mine is a harder race," Alexei Alexandrovich replied respectfully.
And though the reply did not mean anything, the officer pretended that he had heard a clever
phrase from a clever man and had perfectly understood.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Happiness does not depend on outward things, but on the way we see them.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I'll come some day," he said. "But women, my boy, they're the pivot everything turns upon.
Things are in a bad way with me, very bad. And it's all through women. Tell me frankly now,"
he pursued, picking up a cigar and keeping one hand on his glass; "give me your advice.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The march of humanity, springing as it does from an infinite multitude of individual wills, is
continuous.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If everyone fought only for his own convictions, there would be no wars.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Having then for the first time clearly understood that before every man, and before himself,
there lay only suffering, death, and eternal oblivion, he had concluded that to live under such
conditions was impossible; that one must either explain life to oneself so that it does not seem
to be an evil mockery by some sort of devil, or one must shoot oneself.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The soul of man is the lamp of God,’ says a wise Jewish proverb. Man is a weak and
miserable creature when God’s light is not burning in his soul. But when it burns (and it only
burns in souls enlightened by religion), man becomes the most powerful creature in the world.And it cannot be otherwise, for what then works in him is not his own strength, but the strength
of God.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“No one is satisfied with his fortune,and everyone is satisfied with his wit.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I think that to find out what love is really like, one must first make a mistake and then put it
right.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“God forgive me everything!’ she said, feeling the impossibility of struggling...”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Everyone wants to change humanity, but no one is willing to change themselves.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
