Sublime

Tolstoy expressed his exasperation at people who didn’t read deeply and regularly. “I cannot understand,” he said, “how some people can live without communicating with the wisest people who ever lived on earth.”

Le médecin sortit, alla au salon et déclara à Prascovie Fédorovna que son mari allait très mal, et que le seul moyen d’apaiser ses souffrances, qui devaient être atroces, c’était de lui administrer de l’opium. Le docteur avait raison de dire que les souffrances physiques d’Ivan Ilitch étaient intolérables. C’était vrai. Mais ses souffrances morales

People think that if they call the crime of murder “war”, then murder ceases to be murder and crime ceases to be crime. Tolstoy

Every day, from 1905 to 1910, he read thoughts presented in the book for the corresponding day of the year, and he recommended the same habit to all his friends. On May 16, 1908, he wrote to a man named Gusev: “I cannot understand how some people can live without communicating with the wisest people who ever lived on Earth? … I feel very happy ever

Try always to eliminate in yourself any wish to dominate others, do not seek glory or praise – this can all lead to the ruin of your soul. Do not allow yourself to think that you possess particular virtues that are lacking in others. From Pious Thoughts

Your actions should be determined not by the desire of the people around you, but by the needs of all mankind.

The Christianity of Tolstoy is, when we come to consider it, one of the most thrilling and dramatic incidents in our modern civilisation.

The only real science is the knowledge of how a person should live his life. And this knowledge is open to everyone.

“Wait, I’ll tell you what I think myself. I think that if the beast dormant in man could be stopped by the threat of, whatever, the lockup or requital beyond the grave, the highest emblem of mankind would be a lion tamer with his whip, and not the preacher who sacrifices himself.