“He meditated on the use to which he should put all the energy of youth which comes to a
man only once in life. Should he devote this power, which is not the strength of intellect or
heart or education, but an urge which once spent can never return, the power given to a man
once only to make himself, or even – so it seems to him at the time – the universe into
anything he wishes: should he devote it to art, to science, to love, or to practical activities?
True, there are people who never have this urge: at the outset of life they place their necks
under the first yoke that offers itself, and soberly toil away in it to the end of their days.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“True religion is that relationship, in accordance with reason and knowledge which man
establishes with the infinite world around him, and which binds his life to that infinity and
guides his actions.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“There are no conditions to which a man cannot become used, especially if he sees that all
around him are living in the same way.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“For a few seconds they looked silently into each other's eyes, and the distant and
impossible suddenly became near, possible, and inevitable.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“In Varenka, she realized that one has but to forget oneself and love others, and one will be
calm, happy, and noble.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Muhammad has always been standing higher than the Christianity. He does not consider god
as a human being and never makes himself equal to God. Muslims worship nothing except
God and Muhammad is his Messenger. There is no any mystery and secret in it.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“At that moment it meant nothing to him who might be standing over him, or what was said
of him; he was only glad that people were standing near him and only wished that they would
help him and bring him back to life, which seemed to him so beautiful now that he had today
learned to understand it so differently.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
Why am I going?" he repeated, looking straight into her eyes. "You know that I am going in
order to be where you are," said he. "I cannot do otherwise."
―
Leo Tolstoy
“To know God and to live is one and the same thing. God is life.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Having then for the first time clearly understood that before every man, and before himself,
there lay only suffering, death, and eternal oblivion, he had concluded that to live under such
conditions was impossible; that one must either explain life to oneself so that it does not seem
to be an evil mockery by some sort of devil, or one must shoot oneself.
―
Leo Tolstoy
“[...most men do not try] to recognize the truth, but to persuade themselves that the life they
are leading, which is what they like and are used to, is a life perfectly consistent with truth.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow- witted man if he has not
formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most
intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt,
what is laid before him.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Now one often saw only her face and body, while her soul was not seen at all.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I assure you that I sleep anywhere, and always like a dormouse.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What you spoke of just now was a mistake, not love”
―
Leo Tolstoy
