Towards the end of November, during a thaw, at nine o'clock one morning, a train on the Warsaw and Petersburg railway was approaching the latter city at full speed. The morning was so damp and misty t...
To love people as they are is impossible. And yet one must. And therefore do good to them, clenching your feelings, holding your nose, and shutting your eyes (this last is necessary). Endure evil from...
To kill for murder is an immeasurably greater evil than the actual crime itself. Judicial murder is immeasurably more horrible than one committed by a robber. Someone killed by a robber, knifed at nig...
To consider freedom as directly dependent on the number of man’s requirements and the extent of their immediate satisfaction shows a twisted understanding of human nature, for such an interpretation o...
To begin with, at home I spent most of my time reading. I wanted to stifle all that was continuously boiling up inside me through external impressions. Out of all external impressions, reading was the...
Thus a man will sometimes suffer half an hour of mortal fear with a robber, but once the knife is finally at his throat, even fear vanishes.
Through error you come to the truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach any truth without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a hundred and fourteen.
Though the sleepy, myopic, and rather bald-pated figure reflected in the mirror was precisely of such insignificant quality as to arrest decidedly no one's exclusive attention at first sight, its owne...
This idea is a great idea, and a Christian idea could not have found fuller expression. Repentance can go no further than the astonishing heroic deed that you have contemplated, if only…
There, on the corner, stood a thick crowd of people, all of them peasants. He made his way into the very thick of them, peering into their faces. For some reason he felt drawn to talk with everyone.
There is a great and unresolved thought in him. He's one of those who don't need millions, but need to resolve their thought.
There exists no greater or more painful anxiety for a man who has freed himself from all religious bias, than how he shall soonest find a new object or idea to worship. But man seeks to bow before tha...
There are three Powers, three unique Forces upon earth, capable of conquering for ever by charming the conscience of these weak rebels--men--for their own good; and these Forces are: Miracle, Mystery...
The whole article, quite a long and verbose one, was written with the sole purpose of self-display. One could simply read it between the lines: Pay attention to me, look at how I was in those moments....
The vast mass of mankind is mere material, and only exists in order by some great effort, by some mysterious process, by means of some crossing of races and stocks, to bring into the world at last per...
The stupider one is, the clearer one is. Stupidity is brief and artless, while intelligence wriggles and hides itself. Intelligence is a knave, but stupidity is honest and straightforward. I’ve
The silence of earth seemed to melt into the silence of the heavens. The mystery of earth was one with the mystery of the stars ...
The riff-raff that exists in every society rises to the surface in any time of transition, and is utterly devoid not only of any goal, but even the slightest indication of an idea, and merely gives ex...
The only gain of civilisation for mankind is the greater capacity for variety of sensations--and absolutely nothing more. And through the development of this many-sidedness man may come to finding enj...
The exposure of the conspiracy, the thanks from Petersburg, a career in the future, the influence of ‘kindness’ on the young people to keep them from falling into the abyss — all this coexisted in com...