“All great literature is one of two stories; a man goes on a journey or a stranger comes to
town.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“What is the cause of historical events? Power. What is power? Power is the sum total of
wills transferred to one person. On what condition are the willso fo the masses transferred to
one person? On condition that the person express the will of the whole people. That is, power
is power. That is, power is a word the meaning of which we do not understand. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“So that's what it is!" he suddenly exclaimed aloud. "What joy!”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“When you love someone, you love the person as they are, and not as you'd like them to be.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“I saw that all who do not profess an identical faith with themselves are considered by the
Orthodox to be heretics, just as the Catholics and others consider the Orthodox to be heretics.
And i saw that the Orthodox (though they try to hide this) regard with hostility all who do not
express their faith by the same external symbols and words as themselves; and this is
naturally so; first, because the assertion that you are in falsehood and I am in truth, is the most
cruel thing one man can say to another; and secondly, because a man loving his children and
brothers cannot help being hostile to those who wish to pervert his children and brothers to a
false belief. And that hostility is increased in proportion to one's greater knowledge of theology.
And to me who considered that truth lay in union by love, it became self-evident that theology
was itself destroying what it ought to produce.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Rest, nature, books, music...such is my idea of happiness.”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Many people have ideas on how others should change; few people have ideas on how
they should change. ”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“Man lives consciously for himself, but serves as an unconscious instrument for the
achievement of historical, universally human goals. ”
―
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
“She did worse than break the law, she broke the rules”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“without knowing who I am and why I’m here it is impossible to live. Yet I cannot know that
and therefore I cannot live”
―
Leo Tolstoy
“The only thing that we know is that we know nothing, and that is the highest flight of human
wisdom.”
―
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
“And for him, who lived in a certain circle, and who required some mental activity such as
usually develops with maturity, having views was as necessary as having a hat.”
―
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
