Leo Tolstoy
Author of War and Peace and Anna Karenina
Most quoted
"One of the most widespread superstitions is that every man has his own special, definite qualities: that he is kind, cruel, wise, stupid, energetic, apathetic, etc. Men are not like that... men are like rivers: the water is the same in each, and alike in all; but every river is narrow here, is more rapid there, here slower, there broader, now clear, now cold, now dull, now warm. It is the same with men."
— from War and Peace, 1869
"A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor — such is my idea of happiness."
— from Family Happiness, 1878
"The anarchists are right in everything; in the negation of the existing order, and in the idea of a state of society based on freedom and equality, in the idea of a future social order; only they are on the wrong track in believing that this state of society can be brought about by violence."
— from Letter to a Non-Commissioned Officer, 1900
All quotes by Leo Tolstoy (276)
The highest good is to live in peace with all men.
It is easier to fight a thousand enemies than to conquer oneself.
The more a man loves, the more he suffers.
The truth is always the same, but the way it is told makes all the difference.
The only way to be truly happy is to love others.
A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food; therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral.
Truth, like gold, is not to be obtained by growing it, but by digging for it.
The only way to be saved from the terrible consequences of life is to live it fully.
The highest wisdom has but one science—the science of the whole—the science of understanding what this world is and what place we occupy in it.
Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love. Everything is united by it alone. Love is God, and to die means that I, a particle of love, shall return to the general and eternal source.
The greater the man, the greater the simplicity.
Our body is a machine for living. It is organized for that. Stop troubling it with your thoughts.
Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.
The highest good is to live in peace and harmony with oneself and with others.
Death is not the end, but the beginning of a new life.
The meaning of life is to be found in the service of others.
To live means to suffer, to survive means to find some meaning in the suffering.
The more a man is imbued with the true spirit of life, the more he is conscious of his own insignificance.
Life is a series of awakenings.
The highest spiritual state is to be free from all desires.
Contemporaries of Leo Tolstoy
Other Literatures born within 50 years of Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910).