Quotes from Leo Tolstoy

No hay situación a la que el hombre no se acostumbre, especialmente si todos los que le rodean la soportan como él.

She saw that look that had struck her, of bewilderment and humble submissiveness.

Upon meeting, you're judged by your clothes, upon parting, you're judged by your wits.

He had drawn up a carved, velvet chair and was resting his left hand on its back, holding a candle, and using his right hand to cross himself, rolling his eyes upwards every time he put his fingers to his forehead. His face conveyed a gentle piety and resignation to the will of God. 'If you cannot understand feelings like these,' his face seemed to say, 'that's too bad for you.

however irrational and distorted might be the replies given by faith, they have this advantage, that they introduce into every answer a relation between the finite and the infinite, without which there can be no solution.

They haven't an idea of what happiness is; they don't know that without our love, for us there is neither happiness nor unhappiness—no life at all,

A spiritual wound produced by a rending of the spiritual body is like a physical wound and, strange as it may seem, just as a deep wound may heal and its edges join, physical and spiritual wounds alike can yet heal completely only as the result of a vital force from within. Natasha's wound healed in that way. She thought her life was ended, but her love for her mother unexpectedly showed her that the essence of life—love—was still active within her. Love awoke and so did life.

in their eyes the position of an unsuccessful lover of a girl, or of any woman free to marry, might be ridiculous. But the position of a man pursuing a married woman, and, regardless of everything, staking his life on drawing her into adultery, has something fine and grand about it, and can never be ridiculous;

Pourquoi injuste ? Il ne nous est pas donné de savoir ce qui est juste ou injuste ! L'humanité s'est toujours trompée et se trompera toujours sur ce sujet.

It is clear that he is not an exceptional evil-doer, but a most ordinary boy; every one sees it—and that he has become what he is simply because he got into circumstances that create such characters, and, therefore, to prevent such a boy from going wrong the circumstances that create these unfortunate beings must be done away with.

And should there be nothing left but to die?" he thought. "Well, if need be, I shall do it no worse than others.

I'll fail in the same way to understand with my reason why I pray, and yet I will pray—but my life now, my whole life, regardless of all that may happen to me, every minute of it, is not only not meaningless, as it was before, but has the unquestionable meaning of the good which it is in my power to put into it!

I won't say life wouldn't be worth living without it, but it would be dull

La razón no ha descubierto que se amase al prójimo, porque eso no es razonable. Constantino Levin

Rational knowledge presented by the learned and wise, denies the meaning of life, but the enormous masses of men, the whole of mankind receive that meaning in irrational knowledge. And that irrational knowledge is faith, that very thing which I could not but reject. It is God, One in Three; the creation in six days; the devils and angels, and all the rest that I cannot accept as long as I retain my reason.

Adonai is the name of the creator of the world. Elohim is the name of the ruler of all. The third name is the name unutterable which means the All. Talks

I never could understand the fondness some people have for confusing their minds by dwelling on mystical books that merely awaken their doubts and excite their imagination, giving them a bent for exaggeration quite contrary to Christian simplicity. Let

We don't love people so much for the good they have done us, as for the good we have done them.

The manner of life you have chosen is reflected, I suppose, in your ideas

The mob is terrible—disgusting," he said to himself in French. "They are like wolves whom nothing but flesh can appease.

A feeling such as she had known when about to take the first plunge in bathing came upon her, and she crossed herself. That familiar gesture brought back into her soul a whole series of girlish and childish memories, and suddenly the darkness that had covered everything for her was torn apart, and life rose up before her for an instant with all its bright past joys.

your consciousness of existence is derived from the conjunction of all your sensations, that that consciousness of existence is the result of your sensations.

I strove to shatter and destroy that love, which had come to torture me. I did not destroy it, but I destroyed that part of it which gave me pain. Then I grew calm; and I feel love still, but it is a different kind of love.

Karataev had no attachments, friendships or love, as Pierre understood them; but he loved and lived lovingly with everything that life brought his way, especially other people- not any specific people, but those who were there before his eyes.