(Ivan) Hold your tongue, or I’ll kill you!(The devil) You’ll kill me? No, excuse me, I will speak. I came to treat myself to that pleasure. Oh, I love the dreams of my ardent young...

Do you think it is a vain hope that one day man will find joy in noble deeds of light and mercy, rather than in the coarse pleasures he indulges in today — gluttony, fornication,...

Know, then, that now, precisely now, these people are more certain than ever before that they are completely free, and at the same time they themselves have brought us their freedom and obediently laid it...

Reality is infinitely diverse, compared with even the subtlest conclusions of abstract thought, and does not allow of clear-cut and sweeping distinctions. Reality resists classification.

In short, the right given to one man to inflict corporal punishment on another is one of the ulcers of society, one of the most powerful destructive agents of every germ and every budding attempt...

It’s precisely in despair that you find the most intense pleasure, especially if you are already powerfully conscious of the hopelessness of your predicament.

The science of this world, which has become a great power, has, especially in the last century, analysed everything divine handed down to us in the holy books. After this cruel analysis the learned of...

At some thoughts one stands perplexed – especially at the sight of men’s sin – and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on...

O amor é um mistério divino, que deve permanecer escondido aos olhos de todos, aconteça o que acontecer.

We’ve got facts,” they say. But facts aren’t everything; at least half the battle consists in how one makes use of them!

There are seconds, they come only five or six at a time, and you suddenly feel the presence of eternal harmony, fully achieved. It is nothing earthly; not that it’s heavenly, but man cannot endure...

—No, no le dije una palabra de eso; de cualquier manera, no habría comprendido. Pienso que, si con la ayuda de la lógica se puede convencer a alguien de que no hay razón para llorar,...

originality and a feeling of one’s own dignity are achieved only through work and struggle.

The prince says that the world will be saved by beauty! And I maintain that the reason he has such playful ideas is that he is in love.

Do you suppose, gentlemen, that our children as they grow up and begin to reason can avoid such questions? No, they cannot, and we will not impose on them an impossible restriction. The sight of...

Money is the honey of humanity.

If God does not exist, everything is permitted.

Perhaps,” you will add, grinning, “those who have never been slapped will also not understand” – thereby politely hinting that I, too, may have experienced a slap in my life, and am therefore speaking as...

In wine is truth, and the truth had all come out, “that is, all the uncleanness of his coarse and envious heart”!

All of a sudden I became aware of a little star in one of those patches and I began looking at it intently. That was because the little star gave me an idea: I made...

Love the animals. God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. Don’t trouble it, don’t harass them, don’t deprive them of their happiness, don’t work against God’s intent.

People talk sometimes of ‘bestial’ cruelty, but that’s a great injustice and insult to the beast; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically, so artfully cruel.

I did dream of it, chiefly because ‘all things are lawful.’ That was quite right what you taught me, for you talked a lot to me about that. For if there’s no everlasting God, there’s...

The only gain of civilisation for mankind is the greater capacity for variety of sensations – and absolutely nothing more.

To love someone means to see them as God intended them.

Without God all things are permitted.

Listen, listen!” I interrupted her. “Forgive me if I tell you something else…. I tell you what, I can’t help coming here to-morrow, I am a dreamer; I have so little real life that I...

…everyone needs a somewhere, a place he can go. There comes a time, you see, inevitably there comes a time you have to have a somewhere you can go!

What is most vile and despicable about money is that it even confers talent. And it will do so until the end of the world.

You see, gentlemen, reason is an excellent thing, there’s no disputing that, but reason is nothing but reason and satisfies only the rational side of man’s nature, while will is a manifestation of the whole...

You take evil for good. It’s a passing crisis. It’s the result of your illness, perhaps.- You do despise me! It’s simply that I don’t want to do good, I want to do evil, and...

Too many riddles weigh men down on earth. We must solve as we can, and try to keep a dry skin in the water.

However, do you know what? I am convinced that fellows like me who live in dark cellars must be kept under restraint. They may be able to live in their dark cellars for forty years...

It is a law of nature that every decent man on earth is bound to be a coward and a slave

But she forgot nothing, and he sometimes forgot much too quickly, and, often that same day, encouraged by her composure, would laugh and frolic over the champagne, if friends stopped by. What venom must have...

What they have is science, and in science only that which is subject to the senses. The spiritual world, on the other hand, the loftier half of the man’s being, is rejected altogether, cast out...

Truth with love is a lie

Does it matter whether it was a dream or a reality, if the dream made known to me the truth?

I was overpowered by the mere sensation of that dream and it alone survived in my sorely wounded heart.

Pues nada ha sido nunca para un hombre o una sociedad humana más insoportable que la libertad.

Ah youth, youth! That’s what happens when you go steeping your soul into Shakespeare

And yet how simple it is: in one day, in one hour everything could be arranged at once! The chief thing is to love others like yourself, that’s the chief thing, and that’s everything; nothing...

I am a dreamer. I know so little of real life that I just can’t help re-living such moments as these in my dreams, for such moments are something I have very rarely experienced. I...

Oh, you knew that your deed would be preserved in books, would reach tghe depths of the ages and the utmost limits of the earth, and you hoped that, following you, man, too, would remain...

…if there really is some day discovered a formula for all our desires and caprices – that is, an explanation of what they depend upon, by what laws they arise, how they develop, what they...

Em casa, lia a maior parte do tempo; tentava assim extinguir sob impressões exteriores o que fervilhava constantemente em mim. As únicas expressões exteriores de que dispunha vinham-me da leitura. Elas eram pra mim um...

At first it was simply liking, Nastenka, but now, now !I am just in the same position as you were when you went to him with your bundle. In a worse position than you, Nastenka,because...

Fathers, provoke not your children to wrath.

There is only one salvation for you: take yourself up, and make yourself responsible for all the sins of men. For indeed it is so, my friend, and the moment you make yourself sincerely responsible...

It is man’s unique privilege, among all other organisms. By pursuing falsehood you will arrive at the truth!