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Top Leo Tolstoy Quotes

Browse top 822 most favorite famous quotes and sayings by Leo Tolstoy.

Favorite Leo Tolstoy Quotes

1. "The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity." ~ Leo Tolstoy
2. "For love? What antediluvian notions you have! Can one talk of love in these days?" said the ambassador's wife."What's to be done? It's a foolish old fashion that's kept up still," said Vronsky." ~ Leo Tolstoy
3. "scattered" ~ Leo Tolstoy
4. "Darya" ~ Leo Tolstoy
5. "The pleasure lies not in discovering truth, but in searching for it." ~ Leo Tolstoy
6. "But that's the whole aim of civilization: to make everything a source of enjoyment." ~ Leo Tolstoy
7. "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." ~ Leo Tolstoy
8. "He disliked contradiction, and still more, arguments that were continually skipping from one thing to another, introducing new and disconnected points, so that there was no knowing to which to reply." ~ Leo Tolstoy
9. "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." ~ Leo Tolstoy
10. "I think... if it is true that there are as many minds as there are heads, then there are as many kinds of love as there are hearts." ~ Leo Tolstoy
11. "To educate the peasantry, three things are needed: schools, schools and schools." ~ Leo Tolstoy
12. "I did not myself know what I wanted: I feared life, desired to escape from it, yet still hoped something of it." ~ Leo Tolstoy
13. "At that instant he knew that all his doubts, even the impossibility of believing with his reason, of which he was aware in himself, did not in the least hinder his turning to God. All of that now floated out of his soul like dust. To whom was he to turn if not to Him in whose hands he felt himself, his soul, and his love?" ~ Leo Tolstoy
14. "The example of a syllogism that he had studied in Kiesewetter's logic: Caius is a man, men are mortal, therefore Caius is mortal, had throughout his whole life seemed to him right only in relation to Caius, but not to him at all." ~ Leo Tolstoy
15. "I do value my work awfully; but in reality only consider this: all this world of ours is nothing but a speck of mildew, which has grown up on a tiny planet. And for us to suppose we can have something great - ideas, work - it's all dust and ashes." ~ Leo Tolstoy
16. "That only shows you have no heart,' she said. But her eyes said that she knew he had a heart, and that was why she was afraid of him" ~ Leo Tolstoy
17. "Each time of life has its own kind of love." ~ Leo Tolstoy
18. "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!" ~ Leo Tolstoy
19. "It boils down to this: we should have done with humbug, and let war be war, and not a game ... If there were none of this magnanimity business in warfare, we should never go to war, except for something worth facing certain death for." ~ Leo Tolstoy
20. "Sve sretne obitelji su podjednako, svaki nesretna obitelj nesretna je na svoj nacin." ~ Leo Tolstoy
21. "intrigue" ~ Leo Tolstoy
22. "Sim, é só isso', refletiu Dária Aleksandrovna, ao recordar sua vida naqueles quinze anos de casamento, 'gravidez, enjoo, pensamento embotado, indiferença a tudo e, principalmente, feitura. (...) O parto, o sofrimento, um sofrimento horrendo, aquele último minuto... (...)'E tudo isso para quê? No que vai dar, tudo isso? Vai dar em que eu, sem ter um só minuto de tranquilidade, ora grávida, ora amamentndo, sempre irritada, rabugenta, um peso para mim mesma e um tormento para os outros, e também repulsiva para o meu marido, vou consumindo a minha vida e criando filhos infelizes, mal-educados e indigentes." ~ Leo Tolstoy
23. "Slavery, you know, is nothing else than the unwilling labor of many. Therefore to get rid of slavery it is necessary that people should not wish to profit by the forced labor of others and should consider it a sin and a shame. But they go and abolish the external form of slavery and arrange so that one can no longer buy and sell slaves, and they imagine and assure themselves that slavery no longer exists, and do not see or wish to see that it does, because people still want and consider it good and right to exploit the labor of others." ~ Leo Tolstoy
24. "Muito comummente, um homem adormecido luta com um mal doloroso do qual se quer livrar e constata, despertando, a existência desse mal no fundo de si mesmo." ~ Leo Tolstoy
25. "Maar plotseling begon mijn hart sneller te slaan, mijn hand beefde en drukte de zijne; ik werd warm en met mijn ogen zocht ik in het halfduister zijn blik en plotseling voelde ik, dat ik niet bang voor hem was, maar dat deze angst liefde was, een nieuwe liefde, groter en inniger dan vroeger." ~ Leo Tolstoy
26. "I understood, not with my intellect but with my whole being, that no theories of the rationality of existence or of progress could justify such an act; I realized that even if all the people in the world from the day of creation found this to be necessary according to whatever theory, I knew that it was not necessary and that it was wrong. Therefore, my judgments must be based-on what is right and necessary and not on what people say and do; I must judge not according to progress but according to my own heart." ~ Leo Tolstoy
27. "the children themselves repaid her griefs with small joys. These joys were so small that they could not be seen, like gold in the sand, and in her bad moments she saw only the griefs, only sand; but there were also good moments, when she saw only joys, only gold." ~ Leo Tolstoy
28. "I'm like a starving man who has been given food. Maybe he's cold, and his clothes are torn, and he's ashamed, but he's not unhappy." ~ Leo Tolstoy
29. "Boredom is desire seeking desire." ~ Leo Tolstoy
30. "We walked to meet each other up at the time of our love and then we have been irresistibly drifting in different directions, and there's no altering that." ~ Leo Tolstoy
31. "It was long before I could believe that human learning had no clear answer to this question. For a long time it seemed to me, as I listened to the gravity and seriousness wherewith Science affirmed its positions on matters unconnected with the problem of life, that I must have misunderstood something. For a long time I was timid in the presence in learning, and I fancied that the insufficiency of the answers which I received was not its fault, but was owing to my own gross ignorance, but this thing was not a joke or a pastime with me, but the business of my life, and I was at last forced, willy-nilly, to the conclusion that these questions of mine were the only legitimate questions underlying all knowledge, and that it was not I that was in fault in putting them, but science in pretending to have an answer for them." ~ Leo Tolstoy
32. "I asked: 'What is the meaning of my life, beyond time, cause, and space?' And I replied to quite another question: 'What is the meaning of my life within time, cause, and space?' With the result that, after long efforts of thought, the answer I reached was: 'None'." ~ Leo Tolstoy
33. "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." ~ Leo Tolstoy
34. "Can it be that there is not enough space for man in this beautiful world, under those immeasurable, starry heavens?" ~ Leo Tolstoy
35. "To know God and to live is one and the same thing. God is life." ~ Leo Tolstoy
36. "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
37. "Trebuie sa-i multumesti Lui si tot Lui sa-i ceri ajutor. Numai în El vom gasi linistea, mângâierea, salvarea si iubirea, adauga ea si, înaltându-si privirea la cer, începu sa se roage, dupa cum întelese Alexei Alexandrovici din tacerea ei." ~ Leo Tolstoy
38. "Both salvation and punishment for man lie in the fact that if he lives wrongly he can befog himself so as not to see the misery of his position." ~ Leo Tolstoy
39. "Viata fiecarui om are doua laturi: viata personala, care este cu atat mai libera, cu cat interesele sale sunt mai abstracte, si o viata elementara, de roi, in care omul, fara sa se poata sustrage, implineste legi ce i-au fost prescrise.Constient, omul traieste pentru sine, dar serveste in mod inconstient ca arma pentru atingerea telurilor istorice ale intregii omeniri. O fapta, odata savarsita, e ireversibila, si actiunea ei, concurand in timp cu milioane de actiuni ale celorlalti oameni, capata o insemnatate istorica. Cu cat sta omul mai sus pe scara sociala, cu cat este in fuctie de mai multi oameni, cu atat mai multa putere are asupra celorlalti, cu atat este mai evidenta predestinarea si caracterul neocolit al fiecareia din actiunile sale."Inima tarului e-n mainile Dumnezeirii."Tarul nu este altceva decat sclavul istoriei." ~ Leo Tolstoy
40. "Este incredibil cât de completa este iluzia care ne face sa credem ca frumusetea este în genere bunatate." ~ Leo Tolstoy
41. "She had no need to ask why he had come. She knew as certainly as if he had told her that he was here to be where she was." ~ Leo Tolstoy
42. "No, you're going in vain," she mentally addressed a company in a coach-and-four who were evidently going out of town for some merriment. "And the dog you're taking with you won't help you. You won't get away from yourselves." ~ Leo Tolstoy
43. "Medieval Italian life had recently become so fascinating for Vronsky that he even began wearing his hat and a wrap thrown over his shoulder in a medieval fashion, which was very becoming to him." ~ Leo Tolstoy
44. "Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy" ~ Leo Tolstoy
45. "Before any definite step can be taken in a household, there must be either complete division or loving accord between husband and wife." ~ Leo Tolstoy
46. "No hay situación a la que el hombre no se acostumbre, especialmente si todos los que le rodean la soportan como él." ~ Leo Tolstoy
47. "I have now understood that though it seems to men that they live by care for themselves, in truth it is love alone by which they live." ~ Leo Tolstoy
48. "The little princess, like an old war horse that hears the trumpet, unconsciously and quite forgetting her condition, prepared for the familiar gallop of coquetry, without any ulterior motive or any struggle, but with naive and lighthearted gaiety." ~ Leo Tolstoy
49. "I remember the astonishment I felt when I first read Shakespeare. I expected to receive a powerful esthetic pleasure, but having read, one after the other, works regarded as his best: "King Lear," "Romeo and Juliet," "Hamlet" and "Macbeth," not only did I feel no delight, but I felt an irresistible repulsion and tedium . . . . Shakespeare can not be recognized either as a great genius, or even as an average author. . . . far from being the height of perfection, [King Lear] is a very bad, carelessly composed production, . . . can not evoke among us anything but aversion and weariness. . . . All his characters speak, not their own, but always one and the same Shakespearian, pretentious, and unnatural language . . . ." ~ Leo Tolstoy
50. "What is reason given me for, if I am not to use it to avoid bringing unhappy beings into the world!" ~ Leo Tolstoy
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Today's Quote

Knowlege of God without knowledge of man's wretchedness leads to pride. Knowledge of man's wretchedness without knowledge of God leads to despair. Knowledge of Jesus Christ is the middle course, because by it we discover both God and our wretched state."
Author: Blaise Pascal

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Thin
Wit
Here
Con
Ear
Hen
Tan
Per
Thou
Self
End
She
Ten
Use
Lit
Hey
Son
Able
Though
Act
King
Sin
Ought
Pen
Ring
Lie
Old
Era
Cause
Sit
Felt
Bee
Ally
Yes
Himself
Hear
Hum
Side
Mean
Owe
Seem
Eye
Once
Said
Ways
Cat
Heart
Los
Reason
Eyes

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