“There had been in his past, as in every man's, actions, recognized by him as bad, for
which his conscience ought to have tormented him; but the memory of these evil actions was
far from causing him so much suffering as those trivial but humiliating reminiscences.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If you love me as you say you do,' she whispered, 'make it so that I am at peace.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The only thing that we know is that we know nothing, and that is the highest flight of human
wisdom.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What energy!' I thought. 'Man has conquered everything, and destroyed millions of plants,
yet this one won't submit.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He looked at her as a man looks at a faded flower he has gathered , with difficulty
recognizing the beauty for which he picked and ruined it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Pierre's insanity consisted in the face that he did not wait, as before, for personal reasons,
which he called people's merits, in order to love them, but love overflowed his heart, and
loving people without reason, he discovered the unquestionable reasons for which it was
worth loving them.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Men never understand what honor is, though they're always talking about it”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“We are forced to fall back on fatalism as an explanation of irrational events (that is to say,
events the reasonableness of which we do not understand).”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And then all at once love turns up, and you're done for, done for.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And the moujiks? How do the moujiks die?”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I'd rather end up wishing I hadn’t than end up wishing I had.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“You can love a person dear to you with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with
divine love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Was it by reason that I attained to the knowledge that I must love my neighbor and not to
throttle him?. They told me so when I was a child, and I gladly believed it, because they told
me what was already in my soul. But who discovered it? Not reason! Reason has discovered
the struggle for existence and the law that I must throttle all those who hinder the satisfaction
of my desires. That is the deduction reason makes. But the law of loving others couldn't be
discovered by reason, because it is unreasonable.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“And not only the pride of intellect, but the stupidity of intellect. And, above all, the
dishonesty, yes, the dishonesty of intellect. Yes, indeed, the dishonesty and trickery of
intellect.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
