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fa11d51
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A man cannot get rid of the responsibility, for his own actions.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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d739bbe
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Therein is the whole business of one's life; to seek out and save in the soul that which is perishing.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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0d142bd
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In the depths of his heart Vasili Andreevich knew that it could not yet be near morning, but he was growing more and more afraid, and wished both to get to know and yet to deceive himself.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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20b51ba
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Pierre's insanity consisted in not waiting, as he used to do, to discover personal attributes which he termed "good qualities" in people before loving them; his heart was now overflowing with love, and by loving people without cause he discovered indubitable causes for loving them."
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9482a89
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But the more intensely he thought, the clearer it became to him that it was indubitably so, that in reality, looking upon life, he had forgotten one little fact-that death will come, and all ends; that nothing was even worth beginning, and that there was no helping it anyway. Yes it was awful, but it was so.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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25998cc
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The thought that he might, and very probably would die that night occurred to him, but did not seem particularly unpleasant or dreadful. It did not seem particularly unpleasant, because his whole life had been not a continual holiday, but on the contrary an unceasing round of toil of which he was beginning to feel weary. And it did not seem particularly dreadful, because besides the masters he had served here, like Vasili Andreevich, he alw..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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94f3c7e
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False faith is the major cause of most of our misfortunes. The purpose of a human life is to bring the irrational beginning of our life to a rational beginning. In order to succeed in this, two things are important: (1) to see all irrational, unwise things in life and direct your attention to them and study them; (2) to understand the possibility of a rational, wise life. The major purpose of all teachers of mankind was the understanding of..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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dc935b5
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They say: misfortunes, sufferings...well, if someone said to me right now, this minute: do you want to remain the way you were before captivity, or live through it all over again? For God's sake, captivity again and horsemeat! Once we're thrown off our habitual paths, we think all is lost; but it's only here that the new and the good begins. As long as there's life, there's happiness. There's much, much still to come.
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suffering
war-and-peace
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9e28fdc
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Yes, it is very likely that I shall be killed tomorrow,' he thought. And suddenly at this thought of death a whole series of most distant, most intimate, memories rose in his imagination: he remembered his last parting from his father and his wife; he remembered the days when he first loved her. He thought of her pregnancy and felt sorry for her and for himself, and in a nervously emotional and softened mood he went out of the hut in which ..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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6dd56bb
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Even philanthropy did not have the desired effect. The genuine as well as the false paper money which flooded Moscow lost its value. The French, collecting booty, cared only for gold. Not only was the paper money valueless which Napoleon so graciously distributed to the unfortunate, but even silver lost its value in relation to gold.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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5221ef4
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Levin had often noticed in discussions between the most intelligent people that after enormous efforts, and an enormous expenditure of logical subtleties and words, the disputants finally arrived at being aware that what they had so long been struggling to prove to one another had long ago, from the beginning of the argument, been known to both, but that they liked different things, and would not define what they liked for fear of its being..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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b4a8680
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He saw either death or the approach of it everywhere. But his undertaking now occupied him all the more. He had to live his life to the end, until death came. Darkness covered everything for him; but precisely because of this darkness he felt that his undertaking was the only guiding thread in this darkness, and he seized it and held on to it with all his remaining strength.
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death
despair
dying
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Leo Tolstoy |
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3ec2701
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from ] For a historian considering the achievement of a certain aim, there are heroes; for the artist treating of a man's relation to all sides of life there cannot and should not be heroes, but there should be men.
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truth
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Leo Tolstoy |
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e7e8a2b
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It's beyond everything what's being done in the district, according to what this doctor tells me. He's a very intelligent fellow. And as I've told you before, I tell you again; it's not right for you not to go to the meetings, and altogether to keep out of the district business. If decent people won't go into it, of course it's bound to go all wrong. We pay the money, and it all goes in salaries, and there are no schools, not district nurse..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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12d1d7e
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from
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Leo Tolstoy |
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c73bbae
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I shall go on in the same way, losing my temper with Ivan the coachman, falling into angry discussions, expressing my opinions tactlessly; there will be still the same wall between the holy of holies of my soul and other people, even my wife; I shall still go on scolding her for my own terror, and being remorseful for it; I shall still be as unable to understand with my reason why I pray, and I shall still go on praying; but my life now, my..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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99c8cfe
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All that exists is One. People only call this One by different names.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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040d292
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She felt as though everything were beginning to be double in her soul, just as objects sometimes appear double to over-tired eyes. She hardly knew at times what it was she feared, and what she hoped for. Whether she feared or desired what had happened, or what was going to happen, and exactly what she longed for, she could not have said.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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cd9561c
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And the slaves prided themselves on their master, saying: 'There is no better lord than ours under the sun. He feeds and clothes us well, and gives us work suited to our strength. He bears no malice, and never speaks a harsh word to any one. He is not like other masters, who treat their slaves worse than cattle: punishing them whether they deserve it or not, and never giving them a friendly word. He wishes us well, does good, and speaks kin..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9b306ee
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He spoke that refined French in which our grandparents not only spoke bit thought...
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Leo Tolstoy |
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32da34c
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Natasha, with a vigorous turn from her heel on to her toe, walked over to the middle of the room and stood still... Natasha took the first note, her throat swelled, her bosom heaved, a serious expression came into her face. She was thinking of no one and of nothing at that moment, and from her smiling mouth poured forth notes, those notes that anyone can produce at the same intervals, and hold for the same length of time, yet a thousand tim..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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1b48b47
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As he looked round, she too turned her head .Her shining gray eyes, that looked dark from the thick lashes, rested with friendly attention on his face, as though she were recognizing him, and then promptly turned away to the passing crowd, as though seeking someone. In that brief look Vronsky had time to notice the suppressed eagerness which played over her face, and flitted between the brilliant eyes and faint smile that curved her red lip..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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b6a4fa5
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He suddenly felt that the very thing that had once been the source of his suffering had become the source of his spiritual joy, that what had seemed insoluble when he condemned, reproached and hated, became simple and clear when he forgave and loved.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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9258267
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It occurred to him that his scarcely perceptible attempts to struggle against what was considered good by the most highly placed people, those scarcely noticeable impulses which he had immediately suppressed, might have been the real thing, and all the rest false.
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morality
inspiration
life
philosophy
societal-expectations
society
human-nature
psychology
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Leo Tolstoy |
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c3d969c
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That's my one desire, to be caught," answered Vronsky, with his serene,
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mischievous
rouge
sly
vronsky
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Leo Tolstoy |
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5adf506
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In reality it was just what is usually seen in the houses of people of moderate means who want to appear rich, and therefore succeed only in resembling others like themselves: there are damasks, dark wood, plants, rugs, and dull and polished bronzes -- all the things people of a certain class have in order to resemble other people of that class. His house was so like the others that it would never have been noticed, but to him it ..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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f44909e
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One need only posit some threat to the public tranquility and any action can be justified. All the horrors of the reign of terror were based on concern for public tranquility.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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8eaa656
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A better life can only come when the consciousness of men is altered for the better; and therefore, those who wish to improve life must direct all their efforts towards changing both their own and other people's consciousness.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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3edca47
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The position occupied by Toporoff, involving as it did an incongruity of purpose, could only be held by a dull man devoid of moral sensibility. Toporoff possessed both these negative qualities. The incongruity of the position he occupied was this: It was his duty to keep up and to defend, by external measures, not excluding violence, that Church which, by its own declaration, was established by God Himself and could not be shaken by the gat..
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religion
state-religion
incongruity
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Leo Tolstoy |
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641999c
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Among the people to whom he belonged, nothing was written or talked about at that time except the Serbian war. Everything that the idle crowd usually does to kill time, it now did for the benefit of the Slavs: balls, concerts, dinners, speeches, ladies' dresses, beer, restaurants--all bore witness to our sympathy with the Slavs. With much that was spoken and written on the subject Konyshev did not agree in detail. He saw that the Slav quest..
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realist-fiction
society-novel
manners
novel
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Leo Tolstoy |
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15dd39e
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If once we begin judging and arguing about everything, nothing sacred will be left!
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Leo Tolstoy |
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134bc92
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O ye, who see perplexities over your heads, beneath your feet, and to the right and left of you; you will be an eternal enigma unto yourselves until ye become humble and joyful as children. Then will ye find Me, and having found Me in yourselves, you will rule over worlds, and looking out from the great world within to the little world without, you will bless everything that is, and find all is well with time and with you. KRISHNA.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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00bae13
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He had learned that, as there is no situation in the world in which a man can be happy and perfectly free, so there is no situation in the world in which he can be perfectly unhappy and unfree
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Leo Tolstoy |
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f3cc1e7
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Love them that hate you, but you can't love them whom you hate.
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relationships
love
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Leo Tolstoy |
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2e15e24
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The younger sister was piqued, and in turn disparaged the life of a tradesman, and stood up for that of a peasant. "I would not change my way of life for yours," said she. "We may live roughly, but at least we are free from anxiety. You live in better style than we do, but though you often earn more than you need, you are very likely to lose all you have. You know the proverb, 'Loss and gain are brothers twain.' It often happens that people..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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d4bf508
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Why ask? Why doubt what you cannot help knowing? Why use words when words cannot express what one feels?
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Leo Tolstoy |
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09ed7d0
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When the peasants and their song had vanished from his sight and hearing, a heavy feeling of anguish at his loneliness, his bodily idleness, his hostility to this world, came over him...It was all drowned in the sea of cheerful common labor. God had given the day, God had given the strength. Both day and strength had been devoted to labour and in that lay the reward...Levin had often admired this life, had often experienced a feeling of env..
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work
life
meaningful-life
simple
simplicity
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Leo Tolstoy |
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e9700a6
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Well, what is that to me? I can't see her!" she cried."
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Leo Tolstoy |
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3fad8dc
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There never has been and cannot be a good life without self-control. Apart from self-control no good life is imaginable.
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self-control
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Leo Tolstoy |
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b696419
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Forgive me not according to my unworthiness, but according to thy loving kindness.
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Leo Tolstoy |
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6b82e4b
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So you make a sacrifice!' he threw special emphasis on the last word. 'Well, so do I. What could be better? We complete in generosity--what an example of family happiness!
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Leo Tolstoy |
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435e4cb
|
Doctors came to see her singly and in consultation, talked much in French, German, and Latin, blamed one another, and prescribed a great variety of medicines for all the diseases known to them, but the simple idea never occurred to any of them that they could not know the disease that Natasha was suffering from, as no disease suffered by a by a live man can be known, for every living person has his own peculiarities and always has his own p..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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49b20cb
|
Stepan Arkadyevitch had not chosen his political opinions or his views; these political opinions and views had come to him of themselves, just as he did not choose the shapes of his hat and coat, but simply took those that were being worn. And for him, living in a certain society--owing to the need, ordinarily developed at years of discretion, for some degree of mental activity--to have views was just as indispensable as to have a hat. If t..
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Leo Tolstoy |
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a9edc58
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We will never arrive to the notion of total freedom, that is, the absence of cause
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Leo Tolstoy |