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a804327
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The subject of history is the life of peoples and of humanity. To catch and pin down in words--that is, to describe directly the life, not only of humanity, but even of a single people, appears to be impossible.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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aac234f
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It is very difficult to tell the truth, and young people are rarely capable of it.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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78229e8
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If you turn to a branch of those sciences that try to give a solution to the questions of life--to physiology, psychology, biology, sociology--there you will find an astounding poverty of thought, a very great lack of clarity, completely unjustified claims to answer questions that lie outside their subject and never-ending contradictions between one thinker and others, and even within himself. If you turn to a branch of the sciences that is..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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fbd899e
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When it is impossible to stretch the very elastic threads of historical ratiocination any farther, when actions are clearly contrary to all that humanity calls right or even just, the historians produce a saving conception of 'greatness.' 'Greatness,' it seems, excludes the standards of right and wrong. For the 'great' man nothing is wrong, there is no atrocity for which a 'great' man can be blamed.
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right-or-wrong
napoleon
historians
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Leo Tolstoy |
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a7586fb
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Ma koliko nastojali ljudi, kad ih se nekoliko stotina tisuca skupi na jednom, nevelikom mjestu, da iznakaze tu zemlju na kojoj se stiscu; ma kako sabijali kamenje u zemlju da ne bi nista raslo na njoj; ma kako plijevili svaku travku sto probije; ma kako dimili kamenim ugljenom i petrolejem; ma kako obrezivali drvece i ma kako istjerivali sve zivotinje i ptice - proljece je bilo proljece cak i u gradu.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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5b089e6
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The social conditions of life can only be improved by people exercising self-restraint.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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25bdbbd
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But believe me, my dear boy, there is nothing stronger than those two: patience and time, they will do it all.
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war-and-peace
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Leo Tolstoy |
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91d63b1
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Konstantin Levin regarded his brother as a man of immense intellect and culture, as generous in the highest sense of the word, and possessed of a special faculty for working for the public good. But in the depths of his heart, the older he became, and the more intimately he knew his brother, the more and more frequently the thought struck him that this faculty of working for the public good, of which he felt himself utterly devoid, was poss..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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86603c4
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Don't steal sweet rolls.
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love
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Leo Tolstoy |
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a59e285
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As is always the case with a thoroughly attractive woman, her defect--the shortness of her upper lip and her half-open mouth--seemed to be her own special and peculiar form of beauty.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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85421e0
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I'm not living, I'm waiting for a solution that goes on and on being put off.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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2430302
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My belief assumed a form that it commonly assumes among the educated people of our time. This belief was expressed by the word "progress." At the time it seemed to me that this word had meaning. Like any living individual, I was tormented by questions of how to live better. I still had not understood that in answering that one must live according to progress, I was talking just like a person being carried along in a boat by the waves and th..
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progress
sailing
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Leo Tolstoy |
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fb601f0
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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...."
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dolly
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Leo Tolstoy |
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76ca5c7
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Those joys were so small that they passed unnoticed, like gold in sand, and at bad moments she could see nothing but the pain, nothing but sand; but there were good moments too when she saw nothing but the joy, nothing but gold.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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51c9a84
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Prince Andrei was one of the best dancers of his day. Natasha danced exquisitely. Her little feet in their satin dancing shoes performed their role swiftly, lightly, as if they had wings, while her face was radiant and ecstatic with happiness.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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d591662
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marveling at this boldness and ease in her presence, and not for one second losing sight of her, though he did not look at her. He felt as though the sun were coming near him.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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d4c5d3b
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So that's what it is!" he suddenly exclaimed aloud. "What joy!"
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Leo Tolstoy |
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2b3b509
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He was not thinking that the Christian law which he had wanted to follow all his life prescribed that he forgive and love his enemies; but the joyful feeling of love and forgiveness of his enemies filled his soul.
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love
inspirational
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Leo Tolstoy |
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ff8c8cf
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He wanted and needed their love, but felt none towards them. He now had neither love nor humility nor purity
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Leo Tolstoy |
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0fcb169
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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.
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Leo Tolstoy Louise Maude (Translator) |
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e7c8071
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The latter part of her stay in Voronezh had been the happiest period in Princess Marya's life. Her love for Rostov was not then a source of torment or agitation to her. That love had by then filled her whole soul and become an inseparable part of herself, and she no longer struggled against it. Of late Princess Marya was convinced- though she never clearly in so many words admitted it to herself- that she loved and was beloved.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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cc75a07
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It was necessary that millions of men in whose hands lay the real power -- the soldiers who fired, or transported provisions and guns -- should consent to carry out the will of these weak individuals...
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Leo Tolstoy |
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95c8b87
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There are two aspects to the life of every man: the personal life, which is free in proportion as its interests are abstract, and the elemental life of the swarm, in which a man must inevitably follow the laws laid down for him. Consciously a man lives on his own account in freedom of will, but he serves as an unconscious instrument in bringing about the historical ends of humanity. An act he has once committed is irrevocable, and that act..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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103954c
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I realized that I had been lost, and how I had become lost. I had strayed not so much because my ideas had been incorrect as because I had lived foolishly. I realized that I had been blinded from the truth not so much through mistaken thoughts as through my life itself, which had been spent in satisfying desire and in exclusive conditions of epicureanism. I realized that my questions as to what my life is, and the answer that it is an evil,..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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3988307
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I see that my presence is burdensome to you. Painful as it was for me to become convinced of it, I see that it is so and cannot be otherwise. I do not blame you, and God is my witness that, seeing you during your illness, I resolved with all my soul to forget everything that had been between us and start a new life. I do not repent and will never repent of what I have done; but I desired one thing - your good, the good of your soul - and no..
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anna-karenina
best-of-tolstoy
classic-literature
russian-literature
classics
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Leo Tolstoy |
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377697b
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That which constitutes the cause of the economic poverty of our age is what the English call over-production (which means that a mass of things are made which are of no use to anybody, and with which nothing can be done).
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consumerism
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Leo Tolstoy |
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5ad77c5
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Formerly, when I was told to consider him wise, I kept trying to, and thought I was stupid myself because I was unable to perceive his wisdom; but as soon as I said to myself, he's stupid (only in a whisper of course), it all became quite clear! Don't you think so?' 'How malicious you are to-day!' 'Not at all. I have no choice. One of us is stupid, and you know it's impossible to say so of oneself.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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0fc2091
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All this was clear to me, and I was glad and at peace. Then it is as if someone is saying to me, "See that you remember." And I awoke."
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Leo Tolstoy |
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e2df5d5
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As though tears were the indispensable oil without which the machinery of mutual confidence could not run smoothly between the two sister, the sisters after their tears talked, not of what was uppermost in their minds, but though they talked of outside matters, they understood each other.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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c538041
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He had heard that women often did care for ugly and ordinary men, but he did not believe it, for he judged by himself, and he could not himself have loved any but beautiful, mysterious, and exceptional women.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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dc025d9
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All these institutions [prisons] seemed purposely invented for the production of depravity and vice, condensed to such a degree that no other conditions could produce it, and for the spreading of this condensed depravity and vice broadcast among the whole population.
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prison-camps
prisons
incarceration
vice
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Leo Tolstoy |
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cebb81f
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They had to return to the one sure and never-failing resource- slander.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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88ba757
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The soul of man is the lamp of God,' says a wise Jewish proverb. Man is a weak and miserable creature when God's light is not burning in his soul. But when it burns (and it only burns in souls enlightened by religion), man becomes the most powerful creature in the world. And it cannot be otherwise, for what then works in him is not his own strength, but the strength of God.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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8dc2018
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It is impossible for there to be a person with no religion (i.e. without any kind of relationship to the world) as it is for there to be a person without a heart. He may not know that he has a religion, just as a person may not know that he has a heart, but it is no more possible for a person to exist without a religion than without a heart.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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4550301
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How horrified he would have been if, seven years ago, when he had just come from abroad, someone had told him that there was no need to seek or invent anything, that his rut had long been carved out for him and determined from all eternity, and that, however he twisted and turned, he would be that which everybody was in his position. He could not have believed it. Had he not wished with all his soul to establish a republic in Russia, then t..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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c1a5cee
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There is only one real knowledge: that which helps us to be free. Every other type of knowledge is mere amusement. --VISHNU PURANA,
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9725119
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Life and death are in God's hands
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9e502b8
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Every general and every soldier was conscious of his own insignificance, aware of being but a drop in that ocean of men, and yet at the same time was conscious of his strength as a part of that enormous whole.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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12db840
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The doctrine of Christ, which teaches love, humility, and self-denial, had always attracted me. But I found a contrary law, both in the history of the past and in the present organization of our lives - a law repugnant to my heart, my conscience, and my reason, but one that flattered my animal instincts. I knew that if I accepted the doctrine of Christ, I should be forsaken, miserable, persecuted, and sorrowing, as Christ tells us His follo..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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45f855a
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The doctor arrived towards dinnertime and said, of course, that although recurring phenomena might well elicit apprehension, nonetheless there was, strictly speaking, no positive indication, yet since neither was there any contraindication, it might, on the one hand, be supposed, but on the other hand it might also be supposed. And it was therefore necessary to stay in bed, and although I don't like prescribing, nevertheless take this and s..
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prescription
prevarication
doctors
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Leo Tolstoy |
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5038391
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Reasoning led him into doubt and kept him from seeing what he should and should not do. Yet when he did not think, but lived, he constantly felt in his soul the presence of an infallible judge who decided which of two possible actions was better and which was worse; and whenever he did not act as he should, he felt it at once. So he lived, not knowing and not seeing any possibility of knowing what he was and why he was living in the world, ..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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2c234da
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Nunca seremos amigos, lo sabe usted de sobra. Seremos las personas mas felices o las mas desdichadas. De usted depende. (...) Solo le pido una cosa: que me permita concebir esperanzas y seguir sufriendo como hasta ahora. Y, en caso de que eso no sea posible, ordeneme que desaparezca y desaparecere. No volvera a verme, si mi presencia le resulta tan molesta.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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cfddd87
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As a man cannot lift a mountain, and as a kindly man cannot kill an infant, so a man living the Christian life cannot take part in deeds of violence. Of what value then to him are arguments about the imaginary advantages of doing what is morally impossible for him to do?
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Leo Tolstoy |
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2c2b56b
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Vsichki shchastlivi semeistva si prilichat, vsiako neshchastno semeistvo e neshchastno po svoemu.
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Leo Tolstoy |