“she smiled at him, and at her own fears.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Smiling with pleasure, they went through their memories, not sad, old people's memories,
but poetic, youthful ones, those impressions from the very distant past where dream merges
with reality, and they laughed softly, rejoicing at something.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“He felt that now over his every word, his every deed, there was a judge, a judgment, which
was dearer to him than the judgments of all the people in the world. He spoke now, and along
with his words he considered the impression his words would make on Natasha. He did not
deliberately say what would be please her, but whatever he said, he judged himself from her
point of view.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Because of the self-confidence with which he had spoken, no one could tell whether what he
said was very clever or very stupid.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“If you could forget and forgive what happened. He snatched the chalk with nervous, trembling fingers, and breaking it, wrote the initial letters
of the following phrase, "I have nothing to forget and to forgive; I have never ceased to love
you.”"
―
Leo Tolstoy
“It is often said that the invention of terrible weapons of destruction will put an end to war.
That is an error. As the means of extermination are improved, the means of reducing men whohold the state conception of life to submission can be improved to correspond. They may
slaughter them by thousands, by millions, they may tear them to pieces, still they will march to
war like senseless cattle. Some will want beating to make them move, others will be proud to
go if they are allowed to wear a scrap of ribbon or gold lace.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“We should show life neither as it is or as it ought to be, but only as we see it in our
dreams.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
"Why, whatever loathsome thoughts can you have?" asked Dolly, smiling.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Therein is the whole business of one’s life; to seek out and save in the soul that which is
perishing.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Let fear once get possession of the soul, and it does not readily yield its place to another
sentiment.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“But the law of loving others could not be discovered by reason, because it is unreasonable.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I don't think anything," she said, "but I always loved you, and if one loves anyone, one
loves the whole person, just as they are and not as one would like them to be....”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“In order to forgive, one must have lived through what I have lived through, and may God
spare her that.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I think that in order to know love one must make a mistake and then correct it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy