“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
“But despite the fact that the doctors treated him, bled him, and gave him medicines to drink
-- he recovered.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The most mentally deranged people are certainly those who see in others indications of
insanity they do not notice in themselves.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Even in the valley of the shadow of death, two and two do not make six.”
―
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
“All the diversity, all the charm, and all the beauty of life are made up of light and shade.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I can’t think of you and myself apart. You and I are the same to me”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“But Levin was in love, and so it seemed to him that Kitty was so perfect in every respect
that she was a creature far above everything earthly; and that he was a creature so low and so
earthly that it could not even be conceived that other people and she herself could regard him
as worthy of her.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“that in every individual a spiritual element is manifested that gives life to all that exists, and
that this spiritual element strives to unite with everything of a like nature to itself, and attains
this aim through love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Everything I know, I know because I love.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I simply want to live; to cause no evil to anyone but myself.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“We know that man has the faculty of becoming completely absorbed in a subject however
trivial it may be, and that there is no subject so trivial that it will not grow to infinite proportions
if one's entire attention is devoted to it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Chance created the situation; genius made use of it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He got up, wishing to go around, but the aunt handed him the snuffbox right over Helene,
behind her back. Helene moved forward so as to make room and, smiling, glanced around. As
always at soirees, she was wearing a gown in the fashion of the time, quite open in front and
back. Her bust, which had always looked like marble to Pierre, was now such a short distance
from him that he could involuntarily make out with his nearsighted eyes the living loveliness of
her shoulders and neck, and so close to his lips that he had only to lean forward a little to
touch her. He sensed the warmth of her body, the smell of her perfume, and the creaking of
her corset as she breathed. He saw not her marble beauty, which made one with her gown, he
saw and sensed all the loveliness of her body, which was merely covered by clothes. And
once he had seen it, he could not see otherwise, as we cannot return to a once-exposed
deception.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The assertion that you are in falsehood and I am in truth ist the most cruel thing one man
can say to another”
―
Leo Tolstoy
