“Which is worse? the wolf who cries before eating the lamb or the wolf who does not.
―
Leo Tolstoy
But he had done neither the one nor the other, yet he continued to live, think, and feel, had
even at that very time got married, experienced many joys, and been happy whenever he was
not thinking of the meaning of his life.
―
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
“A man can spend several hours sitting cross-legged in the same position if he knows that
noting prevents him from changing it; but if he knows that he has to sit with his legs crossed
like that, he will get cramps, his legs will twitch and strain towards where he would like to
stretch them.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The most important acts, both for the one who accomplishes them and for his fellow
creatures, are those that have remote consequences.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The question of how things will settle down is the only important question...”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Spring is the time of plans and projects.”
―
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
“I'm getting old, that's the thing! What's in me now won't be there anymore.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“A writer is dear and necessary for us only in the measure of which he reveals to us the
inner workings of his very soul.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Then we should find some artificial inoculation against love, as with smallpox. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The chief reason why the prince was so particularly disagreeable to Vronsky was that he
could not help seeing himself in him. And what he saw in this mirror did not gratify his self-
esteem. He was a very stupid and very self-satisfied and very healthy and very well-washed
man, and nothing else... He was equable and not cringing with his superiors, was free and
ingratiating in his behavior with his equals, and was contemptuously indulgent with his
inferiors... for this prince he was an inferior, and his contemptuous and indulgent attitude to
him revolted him.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The social conditions of life can only be improved by people exercising self-restraint.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The more is given the less the people will work for themselves, and the less they work the
more their poverty will increase.”
―
Leo Tolstoy