Leo Tolstoy Quotes
Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy was a Russian novelist and moral philosopher whose two great novels, War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are among the supreme achievements of world literature. After completing Anna Karenina he underwent a spiritual crisis recorded in A Confession, and devoted the second half of his life to a radical Christian anarchism centered on the Sermon on the Mount, the renunciation of violence, and the dignity of manual labor. The quotes below are attributed to Leo Tolstoy, organized by topic.
Browse Leo Tolstoy by topic
Leo Tolstoy on Death
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“Never did Christ utter a single word attesting to a personal resurrection and a life beyond the grave.”
...никогда Христос ... ни одним словом не утверждал личное воскресение и бессмертие личности за гробом... -
“You will die — and it will all be over. You will die and find out everything — or cease asking.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Bk. V, Ch. 1
Leo Tolstoy on God
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Attributed to Leo Tolstoy:
“The kingdom of God is within you.”
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“The hero of my tale, whom I love with all the power of my soul, whom I have tried to portray in all his beauty, who has been, is, and will be beautiful, is Truth.”
Sevastopol in May (1855), Ch. 16 -
“My Religion (1884), Ch. 8 В чем моя вера?”
...никогда Христос ... ни одним словом не утверждал личное воскресение и бессмертие личности за гробом... -
“My Religion (1884), Ch. 12”
Error is the force that welds men together; truth is communicated to men only by deeds of truth. Only deeds of truth, by introducing light into the conscience of each individual, can dissolve the cohesion of error, and detach men one by one from the mass united together by the cohesion of error. -
“My Religion (1884), as translated in The Human Experience : Contemporary American and Soviet Fiction and Poetry (1989) by the Quaker US/USSR Committee”
I know that my unity with all people cannot be destroyed by national boundaries and government orders. -
“Martin's soul grew very very glad. He crossed himself put on his spectacles, and began reading the Gospel just where it had opened; and at the top of the page he read: I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me in. And at the bottom of the page he read: Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these my brethren even these least, ye did it unto me (Matt. xxv). And Martin understood that his dream had come true; and that the Saviour had really come to him that day, and he had welcomed him.”
Where Love Is, God Is " (1885), also translated as "Where Love is, There God is Also" - (full text online) -
“Where Love Is, God Is " (1885), also translated as "Where Love is, There God is Also" - (full text online)”
Martin's soul grew very very glad. He crossed himself put on his spectacles, and began reading the Gospel just where it had opened; and at the top of the page he read: I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me in. And at the bottom of the page he read: Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these my brethren even these least, ye did it -
“Go — take the mother's soul, and learn three truths: Learn What dwells in man, What is not given to man , and What men live by . When thou hast learnt these things, thou shalt return to heaven.”
What Men Live By(1881) | Ch. IV -
“Quite often a man goes on for years imagining that the religious teaching that had been imparted to him since childhood is still intact, while all the time there is not a trace of it left in him.”
Confession(1882) | Pt. I, ch. 1 -
“The relation of word to thought, and the creation of new concepts is a complex, delicate and enigmatic process unfolding in our soul.”
Pedagogical Writings(1903) | Pegagogicheskie Statli (Pedagogical Writings), pg. 143.
Leo Tolstoy on Happiness
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“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
Все счастливые семьи похожи друг на друга, каждая несчастливая семья несчастлива по-своему. -
Attributed to Leo Tolstoy:
“If you want to be happy, be.”
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“He knew she was there by the joy and fear that overwhelmed his heart.”
Anna Karenina(1875–1877; 1878) | Pt. I, ch. 9
Leo Tolstoy on Justice
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“For us, with the rule of right and wrong given us by Christ, there is nothing for which we have no standard. And there is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Bk. XIV, ch. 18
Leo Tolstoy on Knowledge
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“Sevastopol in May (1855), Ch. 16”
The hero of my tale, whom I love with all the power of my soul, whom I have tried to portray in all his beauty, who has been, is, and will be beautiful, is Truth. -
“I know that my unity with all people cannot be destroyed by national boundaries and government orders.”
My Religion (1884), as translated in The Human Experience : Contemporary American and Soviet Fiction and Poetry (1989) by the Quaker US/USSR Committee -
“There is one evident, indubitable manifestation of the Divinity, and that is the laws of right which are made known to the world through Revelation.”
Anna Karenina(1875–1877; 1878) | Pt. VIII, ch. 19 -
“Now about your family. Do you know that since your daughter came out everyone has been enraptured by her? They say she is amazingly beautiful.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Bk. I, Ch. I -
“The only thing that we know is that we know nothing — and that is the highest flight of human wisdom.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Book V, Ch. I
Leo Tolstoy on Life
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“The only significance of life consists in helping to establish the kingdom of God ; and this can be done only by means of the acknowledgment and profession of the truth by each one of us.”
The Kingdom of God is Within You(1894) | Chapter XII , Conclusion—Repent Ye, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand Variant translation: The sole meaning of life is to serve humanity by contributing to the establishment of the kingdom of God, -
“He did not, and could not, understand the meaning of words apart from their context. Every word and action of his was the manifestation of an activity unknown to him, which was his life.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | About Platon Karataev in Bk. XII, ch. 13 -
“History is the life of nations and of humanity. To seize and put into words, to describe directly the life of humanity or even of a single nation, appears impossible.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Epilogue II, ch. 1 -
“If one has no vanity in this life of ours, there is no sufficient reason for living .”
The Kreutzer Sonata(1889) | Ch. 23. This is not, as it is often quoted, a stand-alone Tolstoy epigram, but part of the narration by the novella's jealousy-ridden protagonist Pozdnyshev. -
“One can only live while one is intoxicated with life; as soon as one is sober it is impossible not to see that it is all a mere fraud and a stupid fraud!”
Confession(1882) | Ch. 4 Variant: It is possible to live only as long as life intoxicates us; once we are sober we cannot help seeing that it is all a delusion, a stupid delusion. -
“For man to be able to live he must either not see the infinite, or have such an explanation of the meaning of life as will connect the finite with the infinite.”
Confession(1882) | Ch. 9 -
“Ivan Ilych's life had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.”
The Death of Ivan Ilyich(1886) | Ch. II -
“To be good and lead a good life means to give to others more than one takes from them.”
The First Step(1892) | Ch. VII -
“The whole historic existence of mankind is nothing else than the gradual transition from the personal, animal conception of life to the social conception of life, and from the social conception of life to the divine conception of life.”
The Kingdom of God is Within You(1894) | Chapter IV , Christianity Misunderstood by Men of Science -
“The whole life of the upper classes is a constant inconsistency. The more delicate a man's conscience is, the more painful this contradiction is to him.”
The Kingdom of God is Within You(1894) | Chapter V , Contradiction Between our Life and our Christian Conscience -
“There is only one enduring happiness in life—to live for others.”
Family Happiness(1859) | Part 1, chapter 2
Leo Tolstoy on Love
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“All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love.”
Thoughts of Prince Andrew Bk XII, Ch. 16 -
“Seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all else is folly. It is the one thing we are interested in here.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Book IV, Ch. 11 -
“To love life is to love God. Harder and more blessed than all else is to love this life in one's sufferings, in undeserved sufferings.”
War and Peace(1865–1867; 1869) | Bk. XIV, ch. 15 -
“When the woman showed her love for the children that were not her own, and wept over them, I saw in her the living God, and understood What men live by .”
What Men Live By(1881) | Ch. XI -
“Then I remembered the first lesson God had set me: "Learn what dwells in man." And I understood that in man dwells Love! I was glad that God had already begun to show me what He had promised, and I smiled for the first time.”
What Men Live By(1881) | Ch. XI -
“Government is violence, Christianity is meekness, non-resistance, love. And, therefore, government cannot be Christian, and a man who wishes to be a Christian must not serve government.”
Letter to Dr. Eugen Heinrich Schmitt (October 12, 1896), translated by Nathan Haskell Dole
Leo Tolstoy on Nature
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“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. And to act so is immoral.”
Writings on Civil Disobedience and Nonviolence (1886)
Leo Tolstoy on Politics
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“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”
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. -
“All state obligations are against the conscience of a Christian: the oath of allegiance, taxes, law proceedings and military service.”
The Kingdom of God is Within You(1894) | Chapter VII , Significance of Compulsory Service -
“The truth is that the State is a conspiracy designed not only to exploit, but above all to corrupt its citizens ... Henceforth, I shall never serve any government anywhere.”
As quoted in Tolstoy (1988) by A. N. Wilson , p. 146
Leo Tolstoy on Truth
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Attributed to Leo Tolstoy:
“Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.”
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“Error is the force that welds men together; truth is communicated to men only by deeds of truth. Only deeds of truth, by introducing light into the conscience of each individual, can dissolve the cohesion of error, and detach men one by one from the mass united together by the cohesion of error.”
My Religion (1884), Ch. 12 -
“One can insult an honest man or an honest woman, but to tell a thief that he is a thief is merely la constation d'un fait [The establishing of a fact.]”
Anna Karenina(1875–1877; 1878) | Pt. IV, ch. 4 -
“One is ashamed to say how little is needed for all men to be delivered from those calamities which now oppress them; it is only needful not to lie.”
Patriotism and Christianity(1896) | Ch. 17
Leo Tolstoy on Virtue
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Attributed to Leo Tolstoy:
“The two most powerful warriors are patience and time.”
Things actually not said by Leo Tolstoy
A number of widely-shared lines are circulated as Leo Tolstoy but are in fact from someone else. Did Leo Tolstoy say these? No. Each entry below pairs the line with the person who actually wrote it.
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Did Leo Tolstoy say this? No.
“Attributed in Wisdom for the Soul : Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing (2006) by Larry Chang, p. 352; this statement appears in late 20th century inspirational books, but with no known citation to original material by Tolstoy.”
This is an aphorism penned by Kozma Prutkov , a fictional author invented by the Count Aleksey Tolstoy (a distant relative of Leo Tolstoy's) and the Zhemchuzhnikov brothers (from "Thoughts and Aphorisms", first published in the weekly "Iskra", 1860). (Disputed.)
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Did Leo Tolstoy say this? No.
“If Mormonism is able to endure, unmodified, until it reaches the third and fourth generation, it is destined to become the greatest power the world has ever known.”
This quote originates in Thomas J. Yates, "Count Tolstoi and the 'American Religion' ", Improvement Era (February 1939): 94 . According to Yates, American diplomat Andrew Dickson White told him (Yates) in an interview that Tolstoy said this to him (White) during a visit to the Tolstoy estate. However, according to Leland A. Feltzer, "Tolstoy and Mormonism", Dialogue 6, no. 1 (Spring 1971): 13–29, DOI: 10.2307/45227501 , Yate likely misremembered the interview. No other contemporaneous evidence corroborates the claim that White visited Tolstoy's estate, and Tolstoy was suspicious of organized religion, making this compliment improbable. (Disputed.)