1,507 Quotes by Leo Tolstoy

There are no conditions to which a person cannot grow accustomed, especially if he sees that everyone around him lives in the same way.

He looked at her as a man might look at a faded flower he had plucked, in which it was difficult for him to trace the beauty that had made him pick and so destroy it

The best stories don't come from "good vs. bad" but "good vs. good.

To evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced, and having evoked it in oneself, then by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds, or forms expressed in words, so to transmit that feeling that others may experience the same feeling - this is the activity of art.

The seductions of power, and all the wealth, honor, and luxury it gives, seem a sufficient aim for men's efforts only so long as they are unattained. Directly a man reaches them he sees all their vanity, and they gradually lose all their power of attraction. They are like clouds which have form and beauty only from the distance; directly one ascends into them, all their splendor vanishes.

Life did not stop, and one had to live.

Then he thought himself unhappy, but happiness was all in the future; now he felt that the best happiness was already in the past.

And you know, there's less charm in life when you think about death--but it's more peaceful.

How can it be that I’ve never seen that lofty sky before? Oh, how happy I am to have found it at last. Yes! It’s all vanity, it’s all an illusion, everything except that infinite sky. There is nothing, nothing – that’s all there is. But there isn’t even that. There’s nothing but stillness and peace. Thank God for that!