“Therefore, all these causes-billions of causes-coincided so as to bring about what
happened. And consequently none of them was the exclusive cause of the event, but the
event had to take place simply because it had to take place.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“To speak of it would be giving importance to something that has none.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“oh God! what am I to do if I love nothing but fame and men's esteem?”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“... for nightinggales - we know - can’t live on fairytales.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And so there was no single cause for war, but it happened simply because it had to
happen”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The most mentally deranged people are those who see in others indications of insanity
they do not notice in themselves.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He soon felt that the realization of his longing gave him only one grain of the mountain of
bliss he had anticipated. That realization showed him the eternal error men make by imagining
that happiness consists in the gratification of their wishes.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“It's different for you and me. You study, you become enlightened; I study, I become
confused.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A better life can only come when the consciousness of men is altered for the better; and
therefore, those who wish to improve life must direct all their efforts towards changing both
their own and other people’s consciousness.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“There it is!' he thought with rapture. 'When I was already in despair, and when it seemed
there would be no end- there it is! She loves me. She's confessed it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He wanted and needed their love, but felt none towards them. He now had neither love nor
humility nor purity”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“For if we allow that human life is always guided by reason, we destroy the premise that life
is possible at all.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“To say that a work of art is good, but incomprehensible to the majority of men, is the same
as saying of some kind of food that it is very good but that most people can’t eat it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“It seems that only God can know the truth; it is to Him alone we must appeal, and from Him
alone expect mercy.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Everything seemed pleasant and easy to Nikolai during the first part of his stay in
Voronezh and, as generally happens when a man is in a pleasant state of mind, everything
went well and easily.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
