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Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy Quotes

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Famous Leo Tolstoy Quotes

“These loaves, pigeons, and two little boys seemed unearthly. It all happened at the same time: a little boy ran over to a pigeon, glancing over at Levin with a smile; the pigeon flapped its wings and fluttered, gleaming in the sunshine among the snowdust quivering in the air, while the smell of freshly baked bread was wafted out of a little window as the loaves were put out. All this together was so extraordinarily wonderful that Levin burst out laughing and crying for joy.”

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Book:ANNA KARENINA
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“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?”

IfsBelieveSoulReasonHandsTurnsFeltDoubtDustInstantHis LoveImpossibilityHinder
Book:Anna Karenina: Tolstoy's Collections
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“But that had been grief--this was joy. Yet that grief and this joy were alike outside all the ordinary conditions of life; they were loopholes, as it were, in that ordinary life through which there came glimpses of something sublime. And in the contemplation of this sublime something the soul was exalted to inconceivable heights of which it had before had no conception, while reason lagged behind, unable to keep up with it.”

SoulReasonJoyGriefBehindsConditionsOrdinaryHeightContemplationConceptionSublimeGlimpseExaltedOrdinary LifeLoopholes
Book:ANNA KARENINA
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“In order to carry through any undertaking in family life, there must necessarily be either complete division between the husband and wife, or loving agreement. When the relations of a couple are vacillating and neither one thing nor the other, no sort of enterprise can be undertake. Many families remain for years in the same place, though both husband and wife are sick of it, simply because there is neither complete division nor agreement between them.”

YearsOrderWifeOne ThingCoupleHusbandSickRelationEnterpriseAgreementDivisionFamily LifeHusband And WifeUndertakings
Book:The Anna Karenina Companion: Includes Complete Text, Study Guide, Biography, and Character Index: BookCaps Study Guide
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“What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are but how you deal with incompatibility.”

DealsMarriageRelationshipLove YouDivorceMy WifeWeddingToastsMarriage AdviceCompatibleHappy MarriageLove And MarriageMarriage LifePositive MarriageGood MarriageMarriage LoveGreat MarriageCompatibilityInspirational MarriageBest MarriageWedding ToastLasting MarriageWeddings And MarriageMarriage ProblemsIncompatibilityWedding LoveHappy DivorceMarriage DivorceBefore MarriageGreat WeddingMarriage And Love InspirationalEncouraging MarriageWedding SentimentsHappy Marriage AdviceMarriage ToastMarriage WisdomHappy CoupleHappy WifeFinding The Right PersonFather Of The BrideWhat Is Marriage
Author:Leo Tolstoy
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“If goodness has causes, it is not goodness; if it has effects, a reward, it is not goodness either. So goodness is outside the chain of cause and effect.”

IfsCausesEffectsGoodnessRewardsChainsCause And Effect
Book:The Complete Works of Leo Tolstoy: Novels, Short Stories, Plays, Memoirs, Letters & Essays on Art, Religion and Politics: Anna Karenina, War and Peace, Resurrection, The Death of Ivan Ilych, A Confession, The Cossacks, Correspondences with Gandhi, The Kreutzer Sonata, Fables and Stories for Childrenand Many More
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“The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow- witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him.”

IfsKnowsMenInspirationalMadeIdeasDifficultClearDoubtSubjectsShadowIntelligentInvestingInsightfulSimplestIntelligent ManDifficult Subjects
Book:The Kingdom of God is Within You: Christianity Not as a Mystic Religion But as a New Theory of Life
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“Indeed, ask every man separately whether he thinks it laudable and worthy of a man of this age to hold a position from which he receives a salary disproportionate to his work; to take from the people--often in poverty--taxes to be spent on constructing cannon, torpedoes, and other instruments of butchery, so as to make war on people with whom we wish to be at peace, and who feel the same wish in regard to us; or to receive a salary for devoting one's whole life to constructing these instruments of butchery, or to preparing oneself and others for the work of murder.”

PeopleThinkingMenFeelsWarWholeAgeAsksWishPovertyPositionTaxesMurderRegardInstrumentsOneselfWorthyWhole LifeEvery ManPreparingSalaryCannonsButcheryTorpedoes
Author:Leo Tolstoy
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“If a man, before he passed from one stage to another, could know his future life in full detail, he would have nothing to live for. It is the same with the life of humanity. If it had a programme of the life which awaited it before entering a new stage, it would be the surest sign that it was not living, nor advancing, but simply rotating in the same place.”

IfsKnowsMenWould BeHumanityStageDetailsEnteringAdvancingProgrammesFuture LifeRotating
Book:The Kingdom of God Is Within You: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition
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“it is hard for anyone who is dissatisfied not to blame some one else, and especially the person nearest of all to him, for the ground of his dissatisfaction.”

PersonsHardBlameDissatisfactionDissatisfied
Book:ANNA KARENINA – Two Unabridged Translations in One Premium Edition (World Classics Series): The Greatest Romantic Tragedy of All Times from the Renowned Author of War and Peace & The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Including Biographies of the Author)
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“He remembered his mother's love for him, and his family's, and his friends', and the enemy's intention to kill him seemed impossible.”

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Book:WAR AND PEACE Complete Edition – All 15 Books in One Volume (World Classics Series): The Magnum Opus of the Greatest Russian Novelists and Author of Anna Karenina & The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Including the Biography & Memoirs of the Author)
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“Whatever question arose, a swarm of these drones, without having finished their buzzing on a previous theme, flew over to the new one and by their hum drowned and obscured the voices of those who were disputing honestly.”

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Book:The Complete Novels of Leo Tolstoy in One Premium Edition (World Classics Series): Anna Karenina, War and Peace, Resurrection, Childhood, Boyhood, Youth, The Cossacks, The Death of Ivan Ilyich... (Including Biographies of the Author)
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“She was in that highly-wrought state when the reasoning powers act with great rapidity: the state a man is in before a battle or a struggle, in danger, and at the decisive moments of life - those moments when a man shows once and for all what he is worth, that his past was not lived in vain but was a preparation for these moments.”

MenStatesMomentsShowsPastStruggleDangerBattlePreparationVainReasoningMoments Of LifeDecisive Moments
Book:ANNA KARENINA – Two Unabridged Translations in One Premium Edition (World Classics Series): The Greatest Romantic Tragedy of All Times from the Renowned Author of War and Peace & The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Including Biographies of the Author)
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“Don’t you know that you are all my life to me? ...But peace I do not know, and can’t give to you. My whole being, my love...yes! I cannot think about you and about myself separately. You and I are one to me. And I do not see before us the possibility of peace either for me or for you. I see the possibility of despair, misfortune...or of happiness-what happiness!...Is it impossible?" Vronksy”

ThinkingKnowsGivingWholeImpossiblePossibilityDespairMisfortunes
Book:ANNA KARENINA – Two Unabridged Translations in One Premium Edition (World Classics Series): The Greatest Romantic Tragedy of All Times from the Renowned Author of War and Peace & The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Including Biographies of the Author)
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“Music makes me forget my real situation. It transports me into a state which is not my own. Under the influence of music I really seem to feel what I do not feel, to understand what I do not understand, to have powers which I cannot have. Music seems to me to act like yawning or laughter; I have no desire to sleep, but I yawn when I see others yawn; with no reason to laugh, I laugh when I hear others laugh. And music transports me immediately into the condition of soul in which he who wrote the music found himself at that time. ~The Kreutzer Sonata”

FeelsRealSoulStatesReasonSeemsDesireFoundMy OwnSleepForgetSituationLaughingInfluenceConditionsLaughterNo ReasonTransportYawningSonatas
Book:LEO TOLSTOY – The Ultimate Short Stories Collection: 120+ Titles in One Volume (World Classics Series): The Kreutzer Sonata, The Forged Coupon, Hadji Murad, Alyosha the Pot, Master and Man, Father Sergius, Diary of a Lunatic, The Cossacks, My Dream, The Young Tsar, Fables and Stories for Children...
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