“Slavery, you know, is nothing else than the unwilling labor of many. Therefore to get rid of
slavery it is necessary that people should not wish to profit by the forced labor of others and
should consider it a sin and a shame. But they go and abolish the external form of slavery and
arrange so that one can no longer buy and sell slaves, and they imagine and assure
themselves that slavery no longer exists, and do not see or wish to see that it does, because
people still want and consider it good and right to exploit the labor of others.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Levin had been married three months. He was happy, but not at all in the way he had
expected to be. At every step he found his former dreams disappointed, and new, unexpected
surprises of happiness. He was happy; but on entering upon family life he saw at every step
that it was utterly different from what he had imagined. At every step he experienced what a
man would experience who, after admiring the smooth, happy course of a little boat on a lake,
should get himself into that little boat. He saw that it was not all sitting still, floating smoothly;
that one had to think too, not for an instant to forget where one was floating; and that there
was water under one, and that one must row; and that his unaccustomed hands would be
sore; and that it was only to look at it that was easy; but that doing it, though very delightful,
was very difficult.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Talent is the capacity to direct concentrated attention upon the subject: "the gift of seeing
what others have not seen.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Not one word, not one gesture of yours shall I, could I, ever forget...”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“marveling at this boldness and ease in her presence, and not for one second losing sight
of her, though he did not look at her. He felt as though the sun were coming near him.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“There are no conditions to which a person cannot grow accustomed, especially if he sees that
everyone around him lives in the same way.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Those joys were so small that they passed unnoticed, like gold in sand, and at bad
moments she could see nothing but the pain, nothing but sand; but there were good moments
too when she saw nothing but the joy, nothing but gold.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The only happy marriages I know are arranged ones.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Rummaging in our souls, we often dig up something that ought to have lain there unnoticed. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Suppose a problem in psychology was set: What can be done to persuade the men of our
time — Christians, humanitarians or, simply, kindhearted people — into committing the most
abominable crimes with no feeling of guilt? There could be only one way: to do precisely what
is being done now, namely, to make them governors, inspectors, officers, policemen, and so
forth; which means, first, that they must be convinced of the existence of a kind of organization
called ‘government service,’ allowing men to be treated like inanimate objects and banningthereby all human brotherly relations with them; and secondly, that the people entering this
‘government service’ must be so unified that the responsibility for their dealings with men
would never fall on any one of them individually.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Everyone wants to change humanity, but no one is willing to change themselves.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“As the sun and each atom of ether is a shphere complete in itself, yet at the same time
only a part of a whole too vast for man to comprehend, so each individual bears within himself
his own purpose, yet bears it ot serve a general purpose unfathomable to man.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all
else is folly. It is the one thing we are interested in here.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What are you talking about?' cried Lukashka. 'We must go through the middle gates, of
course.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
