“If there existed no external means for dimming their consciences, one-half of the men would at once shoot themselves, because to live contrary to one's reason is a most intolerable state, and all men of our time are in such a state.”
Men
“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
ChangeAll Quotes by Leo Tolstoy
“Music is the shorthand of emotion.”
Music“To say that a work of art is good, but incomprehensible to the majority of men, is the same as saying of some kind of food that it is very good but that most people can't eat it.”
Art“The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life.”
Life“In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.”
God“Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.”
Truth“It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.”
Amazing“All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
Family“One of the first conditions of happiness is that the link between Man and Nature shall not be broken.”
Happiness“Even in the valley of the shadow of death, two and two do not make six.”
Death“The two most powerful warriors are patience and time.”
Patience“There is no greatness where there is no simplicity, goodness and truth.”
Truth“Government is an association of men who do violence to the rest of us.”
Government“All violence consists in some people forcing others, under threat of suffering or death, to do what they do not want to do.”
Death“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.”
Food“If so many men, so many minds, certainly so many hearts, so many kinds of love.”
Love“The greater the state, the more wrong and cruel its patriotism, and the greater is the sum of suffering upon which its power is founded.”
Patriotism“In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful.”
Alone“Faith is the sense of life, that sense by virtue of which man does not destroy himself, but continues to live on. It is the force whereby we live.”
Faith“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
Change