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Men Quotes by Leo Tolstoy

158 Men quotes by Leo Tolstoy

All Men quotes Leo Tolstoy’s page

Tolstoy writes that art is a way to share feelings, even when many people see it differently. He notes that each man has a unique mind, heart, and kind of love, and that people can adapt to any condition. He also compares loving the same person forever to a candle that never burns out.

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There are many faiths, but the spirit is one.

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Art lifts man from his personal life into the universal life.

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In order to understand, observe, deduce, man must first be conscious of himself as alive.

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There are no conditions to which a man cannot become accustomed.

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... a man has to think of his soul before everything else.

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Between the murder of an animal and the murder of a man, there's no more than ONE step!

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Where is there any book of the law so clear to each man as that written in his heart?

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Nothing is so necessary for a young man as the company of intelligent women.

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For man to be able to live he must either not see the infinite, or have such an explanation of the meaning…

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If every man could act as he chose, the whole of history would be a tissue of disconnected accidents.

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If a man does not work at necessary and good things, then he will work at unnecessary and stupid things

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Man recognizes that he will not die, only when he recognizes that he was never born, but always has been, is, and…

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“Both salvation and punishment for man lie in the fact that if he lives wrongly he can befog himself so as not…

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The recognition of the sanctity of the life of every man is the first and only basis of all morality.

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The most important of all sciences man can and must learn is the science of living so as to do the least…

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A man is like a fraction whose numerator is what he is and whose denominator is what he thinks of himself. The…

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In historic events, the so-called great men are labels giving names to events, and like labels they have but the smallest connection…

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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…

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The error arises from the learned jurists deceiving themselves and others, by asserting that government is not what it really is, one…

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A new conception of life cannot be imposed on men; it can only be freely assimilated. And it can only be freely…

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Men pray to the Almighty to relieve poverty. But poverty comes not from God's laws-it is blasphemy of the worst kind to…

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The example of a syllogism that he had studied in Kiesewetter's logic: Caius is a man, men are mortal, therefore Caius is…

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And Levin, a happy father and a man in perfect health, was several times so near suicide that he hid the cord,…

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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…

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Ivan Ilych saw that he was dying, and he was in continual despair. In the depth of his heart he knew he…

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To us, it is incomprehensible that millions of Christian men killed and tortured each other because Napoleon was ambitious or Alexander was…

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Several times I asked myself, "Can it be that I have overlooked something, that there is something which I have failed to…

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As soon as men live entirely in accord with the law of love natural to their hearts and now revealed to them,…

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The vegetarian movement ought to fill with gladness the souls of those who have at heart the realization of God's kingdom upon…

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The best generals I have known were... stupid or absent-minded men. Not only does a good army commander not need any special…

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When it is impossible to stretch the very elastic threads of historical ratiocination any farther, when actions are clearly contrary to all…

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Flesh eating is simply immoral, as it involves the performance of an act which is contrary to moral feeling: By killing, man…

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Government is an association of men who do violence to the rest of us.

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Men need only trust in Christ's teaching and obey it, and there will be peace on earth.

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In order to obtain and hold power, a man must love it.

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Wealth is a great sin in the eyes of God. Poverty is a great sin in the eyes of man.

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“Men never understand what honor is, though they're always talking about it”

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If so many men, so many minds, certainly so many hearts, so many kinds of love.

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The only absolute knowledge attainable by man is that life is meaningless.

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Art is a means of union among men, joining them together in the same feeling.

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More by Leo Tolstoy

These joys were so trifling as to be as imperceptible as grains of gold among the sand, and in moments of depression she saw…

The only significance of life consists in helping to establish the kingdom of God.

“I already love in you your beauty, but I am only beginning to love in you that which is eternal and ever precious –…

Energy rests upon love; and come as it will, there's no forcing it.

“If you only knew what those society women are, and women in general! My father is right. Selfish, vain, stupid, trivial in everything—that's what…

To evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced, and having evoked it in oneself, then by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds,…

To speak of it would be giving importance to that which has none.

Once we're thrown off our habitual paths, we think all is lost, but it's only here that the new and the good begins.

“He knew she was there by the rapture and the terror that seized on his heart. She was standing talking to a lady at…

Rest, nature, books, music...such is my idea of happiness.

“He was not to blame for being born with an irrepressible charachter and a mind some how constrained.”

I ask one thing only: I ask for the right to hope, to suffer as I do. But if even that cannot be, command…

The idea shared by many that life is a vale of tears is just as false as the idea shared by the great majority,…

To say that a work of art is good, but incomprehensible to the majority of men, is the same as saying of some kind…

True life is lived when tiny changes occur.