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The subject of history is the life of peoples and of humanity. To catch and pin down in words--that is, to describe directly the life, not only of humanity, but even of a single people, appears to be impossible.

Leo Tolstoy

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Leo Tolstoy
Age: 82 †
Born: 1828
Born: January 1
Died: 1910
Died: January 1
Diarist
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Essayist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Pedagogue
Philosopher
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Writer
Tolstoi
Tolstoy
Lev Nikolaevich
graf Tolstoĭ
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graf Tolstoy
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Lev
graf Tolsztoj
Лев Николаевич
c граф Толстой
Lew
graf Tolstoi
Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy
Lev Tolstoy
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More quotes by Leo Tolstoy

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There can be only one permanent revolution - a moral one the regeneration of the inner man. How is this revolution to take place? Nobody knows how it will take place in humanity, but every man feels it clearly in himself. And yet in our world everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself.
Leo Tolstoy
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The essence of any religion lies solely in the answer to the question: why do I exist, and what is my relationship to the infinite universe that surrounds me?
Leo Tolstoy
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Whenever my life came to a halt, the questions would arise: Why? And what next?
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He could not be mistaken. There were no other eyes like those in the world. There was only one creature in the world who could concentrate for him all the brightness and meaning of life. It was she. It was Kitty.
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One must put oneself in every one's position. To understand everything is to forgive everything.
Leo Tolstoy
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He knew she was there by the joy and terror that took possession of his heart [...] Everything was lit up by her. She was the smile that brightened everything around.
Leo Tolstoy
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excuse me' he added, taking the opera glasses out of her hands and looking over her bare shoulder at the row of boxes opposite, 'i'm afraid i'm becoming ridiculous
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When ignorance does not know something, it says that what it does not know is stupid.
Leo Tolstoy
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Before we can study the central issues of life today, we must destroy the prejudices and fallacies born of previous centuries.
Leo Tolstoy
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If you love me as you say you do,' she whispered, 'make it so that I am at peace.
Leo Tolstoy
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The only purpose of education is freedom the only method is experience.
Leo Tolstoy
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Man is meant for happiness and this happiness is in him, in the satisfaction of the daily needs of his existence.
Leo Tolstoy
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You see, if you take pains and learn in order to get a reward, the work will seem hard but when you work... if you love your work, you will find your reward in that.
Leo Tolstoy
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Every man had his personal habits, passions, and impulses toward goodness, beauty, and truth.
Leo Tolstoy
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What is important is not the length of life, but the depth of life. What is important is not to make life longer, but to take your soul out of time, as every sublime act does.
Leo Tolstoy
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Nowhere nor in anything, except in the assertion of the Church, can we find that God or Christ founded anything like what churchmen understand by the Church.
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Art is a human activity consisting in this, that one man consciously, by means of certain external signs, hands on to others feelings he has lived through, and that other people are infected by these feelings, and also experience them.
Leo Tolstoy
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Talent is the capacity to direct concentrated attention upon the subject: the gift of seeing what others have not seen.
Leo Tolstoy
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I began to realize that the most profound wisdom of man was rooted in the answers given by faith and that I did not have the right to deny them on the grounds of reason above all, I realized that these answers alone can form a reply to the question of life.
Leo Tolstoy
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For if we allow that human life is always guided by reason, we destroy the premise that life is possible at all.
Leo Tolstoy