Hypocrisy in anything whatever may deceive the cleverest and most penetrating man, but the least wide-awake of children recognizes it, and is revolted by it, however ingeniously it may be disguised
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
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 Nikolaevich Tolstoy
What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
I know that my unity with all people cannot be destroyed by national boundaries and government orders.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
Truth, like gold, is to be obtained not by its growth, but by washing away from it all that is not gold.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
War is so unjust and ugly that all who wage it must try to stifle the voice of conscience within themselves.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
Some mathematician has said pleasure lies not in discovering truth, but in seeking it.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
The religious superstition is encouraged by means of the institution of churches, processions, monuments, festivities....The so-called clergy stupefy the masses....They befog the people and keep them in an eternal condition of stupefaction
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy
Faith is the sense of life, that sense by virtue of which man does not destroy himself, but continues to live on. It is the force whereby we live.
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy