“A battle is won by the side that is absolutely determined to win. Why did we lose the battle
of Austerlitz? Our casualties were about the same as those of the French, but we had told
ourselves early in the day that the battle was lost, so it was lost.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“My principal sin is doubt. I doubt everything, and am in doubt most of the time.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“When a man sees a dying animal, horror comes over him: that which he himself is, his
essence, is obviously being annihilated before his eyes--is ceasing to be. But when the dying
one is a person, and a beloved person, then, besides a sense of horror at the annihilation of
life, there is a feeling of severance and a spiritual wound which, like a physical wound,
sometimes kills and sometimes heals, but always hurts and fears any external, irritating
touch.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“There is nothing, nothing certain but the nothingness of all that is comprehensible to us,
and the grandeur of something incomprehensible, but more important!”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Well, what is that to me? I can't see her!" she cried.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Her motherly instinct told her that there was too much of something in Natasha, and that it
would prevent her from being happy.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Oh, it's awful! oh dear, oh dear! awful!" Stepan Arkadyevitch kept repeating to himself, and
he could think of nothing to be done. "And how well things were going up till now! how well we
got on! She was contented and happy in her children; I never interfered with her in anything; I
let her manage the children and the house just as she liked. It's true it's bad HER having been
a governess in our house. That's bad! There's something common, vulgar, in flirting with one's
governess. But what a governess!" (He vividly recalled the roguish black eyes of Mlle. Roland
and her smile.) "But after all, while she was in the house, I kept myself in hand. And the worst
of it all is that she's already... it seems as if ill-luck would have it so! Oh, oh! But what, what is
to be done?”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Germans are self-confident on the basis of an abstract notion—science, that is, the
supposed knowledge of absolute truth. A Frenchman is self-assured because he regards
himself personally, both in mind and body, as irresistibly attractive to men and women. An
Englishman is self-assured, as being a citizen of the best-organized state in the world, and
therefore as an Englishman always knows what he should do and knows that all he does as
an Englishman is undoubtedly correct. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and
easily forgets himself and other people. A Russian is self-assured just because he knows
nothing and does not want to know anything, since he does not believe that anything can be
known.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“In infinite time, in infinite matter, in infinite space, is formed a bubble organism, and that
bubble lasts a while and bursts, and that bubble is Me.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And therefore the Christian, who is subject only to the inner divine law, not only cannot
carry out the enactments of the external law, when they are not in agreement with the divine
law of love which he acknowledges (as is usually the case with state obligations), he cannot
even recognize the duty of obedience to anyone or anything whatever, he cannot recognize
the duty of what is called allegiance.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Something magical has happened to me: like a dream when one feels frightened and creepy,
and suddenly wakes up to the knowledge that no such terrors exist. I have wakened up.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“They had to return to the one sure and never-failing resource- slander.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Some one dear to one can be loved with human love; but an enemy can only be loved with
divine love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
