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There Is Nothing In The World More Difficult Than Candor, And Nothing Easier Than Flattery. If There Is A Hundredth Of A Fraction Of A False Note To Candor, It Immediately Produces Dissonance, And As A Result, Exposure. But In Flattery, Even If Everything Is False Down To The Last Note, It Is Still Pleasant, And People Will Listen Not Without Pleasure; With Coarse Pleasure, Perhaps, But Pleasure Nevertheless.

-Fyodor Dostoevsky

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There Is Nothing In

Fyodor Dostoevsky

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There Is Nothing In The World More Difficult Than Candor, And Nothing Easier Than Flattery. If There Is A Hundredth Of A Fraction Of A False Note To Candor, It Immediately Produces Dissonance, And As A Result, Exposure. But In Flattery, Even If Everything Is False Down To The Last Note, It Is Still Pleasant, And People Will Listen Not Without Pleasure; With Coarse Pleasure, Perhaps, But Pleasure Nevertheless.

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And Do You Know, Do You Know That Mankind Can Live Without The Englishman, It Can Live Without Germany, It Can Live Only Too Well Without The Russian Man, It Can Live Without Science, Without Bread, And It Only Cannot Live Without Beauty, For Then There Would Be Nothing At All To Do In The World! The Whole Secret Is Here, The Whole Of History Is Here. Science Itself Would Not Stand For A Minute Without Beauty

The Best Way To Keep A Prisoner From Escaping Is To Make Sure He Never Knows He's In Prison.

After All, I Quite Naturally Want To Live In Order To Fulfill My Whole Capacity For Living, And Not In Order To Fulfill My Reasoning Capacity Alone, Which Is No More Than Some One-twentieth Of My Capacity For Living. What Does Reason Know? It Knows Only What It Has Managed To Learn (and It May Never Learn Anything Else; That Isn't Very Reassuring, But Why Not Admit It?), While Human Nature Acts As A Complete Entity, With All That Is In It, Consciously Or Unconsciously; And Though It May Be Wrong, It's Nevertheless Alive.

There Is No Idea, No Fact, Which Could Not Be Vulgarized And Presented In A Ludicrous Light.

Anyone Who Can Appease A Man's Conscience Can Take His Freedom Away From Him.

People With New Ideas, People With The Faintest Capacity For Saying Something New, Are Extremely Few In Number, Extraordinarily So, In Fact.

Love Animals: God Has Given Them The Rudiments Of Thought And Joy Untroubled. Do Not Trouble Their Joy, Don't Harrass Them, Don't Deprive Them Of Their Happiness, Don't Work Against God's Intent. Man, Do Not Pride Yourself On Superiority To Animals; They Are Without Sin, And You, With Your Greatness, Defile The Earth By Your Appearance On It, And Leave The Traces Of Your Foulness After You - Alas, It Is True Of Almost Every One Of Us!

I Used To Analyze Myself Down To The Last Thread, Used To Compare Myself With Others, Recalled All The Smallest Glances, Smiles And Words Of Those To Whom I’d Tried To Be Frank, Interpreted Everything In A Bad Light, Laughed Viciously At My Attempts ‘to Be Like The Rest’ –and Suddenly, In The Midst Of My Laughing, I’d Give Way To Sadness, Fall Into Ludicrous Despondency And Once Again Start The Whole Process All Over Again – In Short, I Went Round And Round Like A Squirrel On A Wheel.

The Whole Work Of Man Really Seems To Consist In Nothing But Proving To Himself Every Minute That He Is A Man And Not A Piano Key.

Love All God’s Creation, Both The Whole And Every Grain Of Sand. Love Every Leaf, Every Ray Of Light. Love The Animals, Love The Plants, Love Each Separate Thing. If Thou Love Each Thing Thou Wilt Perceive The Mystery Of God In All; And When Once Thou Perceive This, Thou Wilt Thenceforward Grow Every Day To A Fuller Understanding Of It: Until Thou Come At Last To Love The Whole World With A Love That Will Then Be All-embracing And Universal.

There Are Chance Meetings With Strangers That Interest Us From The First Moment, Before A Word Is Spoken.

Love Life More Than The Meaning Of It?

Brothers Karamazov

Perhaps A Normal Man Is Supposed To Be Stupid-how Do We Know? Perhaps It's Even Very Beautiful.

The Man Who Has A Conscience Suffers Whilst Acknowledging His Sin. That Is His Punishment.

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 At Our Feet. It Is Our Doing, But Is It What You Wanted? This Sort Of Freedom?' Again I Don't Understand', Alyosha Interrupted, 'is He Being Ironic? Is He Laughing?' Not In The Least. He Precisely Lays It To His And His Colleagues' Credit That They Have Finally Overcome Freedom, And Have Done So In Order To Make People Happy.

There Is Nothing Easier Than Lopping Off Heads And Nothing Harder Than Developing Ideas.

And So In That Very Shame I Suddenly Begin A Hymn.

Brothers Karamazov

The Golden Age Is The Most Implausible Of All Dreams. But For It Men Have Given Up Their Life And Strength; For The Sake Of It Prophets Have Died And Been Slain; Without It The People Will Not Live And Cannot Die.

But Men Love Abstract Reasoning And Neat Systematization So Much That They Think Nothing Of Distorting The Truth, Closing Their Eyes And Ears To Contrary Evidence To Preserve Their Logical Constructions.

I Tell You, The Old-fashioned Doctor Who Treated All Diseases Has Completely Disappeared, Now There Are Only Specialists, And They Advertise All The Time In The Newspapers. If Your Nose Hurts, They Send You To Paris: There's A European Specialist There, He Treats Noses. You Go To Paris, He Examines Your Nose: I Can Treat Only Your Right Nostril, He Says, I Don't Treat Left Nostrils, It's Not My Specialty, But After Me, Go To Vienna, There's A Separate Specialist There Who Will Finish Treating Your Left Nostril.

If She Had Ordered Me To Throw Myself Down Then, I Would Have Done It! If She Had Said It Only As A Joke, Said It With Contempt, Spitting On Me--even Then I Would Have Jumped!

They Tease Me Now, Telling Me It Was Only A Dream. But Does It Matter Whether It Was A Dream Or Reality, If The Dream Made Known To Me The Truth?

Alyosha's Heart Could Not Bear Uncertainty, For The Nature Of His Love Was Always Active. He Could Not Love Passively; Once He Loved, He Immediately Also Began To Help.

Occasionally I Was So Much Better That I Could Go Out; But The Streets Used To Put Me In Such A Rage That I Would Lock Myself Up For Days Rather Than Go Out, Even If I Were Well Enough To Do So! I Could Not Bear To See All Those Preoccupied, Anxious-looking Creatures Continuously Surging Along The Streets Past Me! Why Are They Always Anxious? What Is The Meaning Of Their Eternal Care And Worry? It Is Their Wickedness, Their Perpetual Detestable Malice-that's What It Is-they Are All Full Of Malice, Malice!

But Try Getting Blindly Carried Away By Your Feelings, Without Reasoning, Without A Primary Cause, Driving Consciousness Away At Least For A Time; Start Hating, Or Fall In Love, Only So As Not To Sit With Folded Arms.

Falling In Love

Faith Does Not, In The Realist, Spring From The Miracle But The Miracle From Faith. If The Realist Once Believes, Then He Is Bound By His Very Realism To Admit The Miraculous Also.

My Friends, Ask Gladness From God. Be Glad As Children, As Birds In The Sky. And Let Man's Sin Not Disturb You In Your Efforts, Do Not Feat That It Will Dampen Your Endeavor And Keep It From Being Fulfilled, Do Not Say, Sin Is Strong, Impiety Is Strong, The Bad Environment Is Strong, And We Are Lonely And Powerless, The Bad Environment Will Dampen Us And Keep Our Good Endeavor From Being Fulfilled. Flee From Such Despondency, My Children! There Is Only One Salvation For You: Take Yourself Up, And Make Yourself Responsible For The Sins Of Men.

Yes, That's Right... Love Should Come Before Logic ... Only Then Will Man Come To Understand The Meaning Of Life.

Meaning Of Life

. . . Finally, I Couldn't Imagine How I Could Live Without Books, And I Stopped Dreaming About Marrying That Chinese Prince. . . .

Until You Have Become Really, In Actual Fact, As Brother To Everyone, Brotherhood Will Not Come To Pass.

To A Commonplace Man Of Limited Intellect, For Instance, Nothing Is Simpler Than To Imagine Himself An Original Character, And To Revel In That Belief Without The Slightest Misgiving.

They Won't Let Me ... I Can't Be ... Good!

I Am Alone, I Thought, And They Are Everybody.

- What Is A Socialist? - That's When All Are Equal And All Have Property In Common, There Are No Marriages, And Everyone Has Any Religion And Laws He Likes Best. You Are Not Old Enough To Understand That Yet.

The Essence Of Religious Feeling Does Not Come Under Any Sort Of Reasoning Or Atheism, And Has Nothing To Do With Any Crimes Or Misdemeanors. There Is Something Else Here, And There Will Always Be Something Else - Something That The Atheists Will For Ever Slur Over; They Will Always Be Talking Of Something Else.

Beauty Is Mysterious As Well As Terrible. God And Devil Are Fighting There, And The Battlefield Is The Heart Of Man.

A Hundred Suspicions Don't Make A Proof.

A Man Is No Example For A Woman. It’s A Different Thing.

To Kill Someone For Committing Murder Is A Punishment Incomparably Worse Than The Crime Itself. Murder By Legal Sentence Is Immeasurably More Terrible Than Murder By Brigands.

Life Is What Matters, Life Alone - The Continuous, Eternal Process Of Discovering Life - And Not The Discovery Itself.

How Many Ideas Have There Been In The History Of Man Which Were Unthinkable Ten Years Before They Appeared?

Can A Man Possessing Conciousness Ever Really Respect Himself?

Suppose, Gentleman, That Man Is Not Stupid.

Come, Try, Give Any One Of Us, For Instance, A Little More Independence, Untie Our Hands, Widen The Spheres Of Our Activity, Relax The Control And We...yes, I Assure You...we Should Be Begging To Be Under Control Again At Once.

Then Christ Will Say To Us, 'come You Also! Come You Drunkards! Come You Weaklings! Come You Depraved!' And He Will Say To Us, 'vile Creatures, You In The Image Of The Beast And You Who Bear His Mark. All The Same, You Come Too!' And The Wise And Prudent Will Say, 'lord, Why Are You Welcoming Them? And He Will Say, 'o Wise And Prudent, I Am Welcoming Them Because Not One Of Them Has Ever Judged Himself Worthy. And He Will Stretch Out His Arms To Us, And We Shall Fall At His Feet, And Burst Into Sobs, And Then We Shall Understand Everything, Everything! Lord, Your Kingdom Come!

I Wanted To Pray For An Hour, But I Keep Thinking And Thinking, And Always Sick Thoughts, And My Head Aches - What Is The Use Of Praying? - It's Only A Sin! It Is Strange, Too, That I Am Not Sleepy: In Great, Too Great Sorrow, After The First Outbursts One Is Always Sleepy. Men Condemned To Death, They Say, Sleep Very Soundly On The Last Night. And So It Must Be, It Si The Law Of Nature, Otherwise Their Strength Would Not Hold Out... I Lay Down On The Sofa But I Did Not Sleep...

Let It Not Be A Beautiful Face,' I Thought, 'but To Make Up For That, Let It Be A Noble, An Expressive, And, Above All, An Extremely Intelligent One.

Lack Of Originality, Everywhere, All Over The World, From Time Immemorial, Has Always Been Considered The Foremost Quality And The Recommendation Of The Active, Efficient And Practical Man.

If You Love All Things, You Will Also Attain The Divine Mystery That Is In All Things. For Then Your Ability To Perceive The Truth Will Grow Every Day, And Your Mind Will Open Itself To An All-embracing Love

Everywhere I Am The Object Of An Unbelievable Esteem, The Interest In Me Is, Quite Simply, Tremendous.

I Feel Pity For Him, And That Is A Poor Sign Of Love.

The Absurd Is Only Too Necessary On Earth. The World Stands On Absurdities.

To Love Is To Suffer And There Can Be No Love Otherwise.

Hang Your Merit. I Don't Seek Anyone's Approbation.

For If There's No Everlasting God, There's No Such Thing As Virtue, And There's No Need Of It.

Speak Of A Wolf And You See His Tail!

You Sensed That You Should Be Following A Different Path, A More Ambitious One, You Felt That You Were Destined For Other Things But You Had No Idea How To Achieve Them And In Your Misery You Began To Hate Everything Around You.

Everything Will Come In Due Course, If You Have The Gumption To Wait For It.

Existentialism Isn't So Atheistic That It Wears Itself Out Showing That God Doesn't Exist. Rather, It Declares That Even If God Did Exist, That Would Change Nothing.

With Old Liars Who Have Been Acting All Their Lives There Are Moments When They Enter So Completely Into Their Part That They Tremble Or Shed Tears In Earnest, Although At That Very Moment, Or A Second Later, They Are Able To Whisper To Themselves, "you Know You Are Lying, You Shameless Old Sinner! You're Acting Now, In Spite Of Your 'holy' Wrath.

Although Your Mind Works, Your Heart Is Darkened With Depravity; And Without A Pure Heart There Can Be No Complete And True Consciousness

I Utter What You Would Not Dare Think

Ah, Misha, He Has A Stormy Spirit. His Mind Is In Bondage. He Is Haunted By A Great, Unsolved Doubt. He Is One Of Those Who Don't Want Millions, But An Answer To Their Questions.

Man Has It All In His Hands, And It All Slips Through His Fingers From Sheer Cowardice.

What Is The Use Of Christ's Words, Unless We Set An Example?

He Does Not Like Showing His Feelings And Would Rather Do A Cruel Thing Than Open His Heart Freely.

A Society Should Be Judged Not By How It Treats Its Outstanding Citizens But By How It Treats Its Criminals.

We Must Never Forget That Human Motives Are Generally Far More Complicated Than We Are Apt To Suppose, And That We Can Very Rarely Accurately Describe The Motives Of Another.

If They Drive God From The Earth, We Shall Shelter Him Underground.

I Wanted To Discuss The Suffering Of Humanity In General, But Perhaps We'd Better Confine Ourselves To The Sufferings Of Children.

Can A Man Of Perception Respect Himself At All?

If He's Honest, He'll Steal; If He's Human, He'll Murder; If He's Faithful, He'll Deceive.

In A Way There's Only A Fine Shade Of Difference Between The Healthy And The Deranged.

When . . . In The Course Of All These Thousands Of Years Has Man Ever Acted In Accordance With His Own Interests?

Totally Without Hope One Cannot Live. To Live Without Hope Is To Cease To Live. Hell Is Hopelessness. It Is No Accident That Above The Entrance To Dante's Hell Is The Inscription: "leave Behind All Hope, You Who Enter Here."

The Greater The Stupidity, The Greater The Clarity. Stupidity Is Brief And Guileless, While Wit Equivocates And Hides. Wit Is A Scoundrel, While Stupidity Is Honest And Sincere.

Man Only Likes To Count His Troubles, But He Does Not Count His Joys.

Viper Will Eat Viper, And It Would Serve Them Both Right!

Brothers Karamazov

Woe To The Man Who Offends A Small Child!

I Walked Along Nevsky Avenue.actually It Was More Torture, Humiliation, And Bilious Irritation Than A Stroll.

I Swear To You, Sirs, That Excessive Consciousness Is A Disease--a Genuine, Absolute Disease.

I Am A Sick Man...i Am A Spiteful Man. I Am A Most Unpleasant Man.

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 Life, That Is, Of The Whole Human Life Including Reason And All The Impulses. And Although Our Life, In This Manifestation Of It, Is Often Worthless, Yet It Is Life And Not Simply Extracting Square Roots.

Nothing Is More Seductive For A Man Than His Freedom Of Conscience, But Nothing Is A Greater Cause Of Suffering.

If He's Alive, Everything Is In His Power! Whose Fault Is It That He Doesn't Understand That?

What Can Become Of Him If He Is In Such Bondage To The Habit Of Satisfying The Innumerable Desires He Has Created For Himself? He Is Isolated, And What Concern Has He With The Rest Of Humanity? They Have Succeeded In Accumulating A Greater Mass Of Objects, But The Joy In The World Has Grown Less.

One Must Love Life Before Loving Its Meaning ... Yes, And When The Love Of Life Disappears, No Meaning Can Console Us.

Pass Us By, And Forgive Us Our Happiness

But Man Is So Addicted To Systems And To Abstract Conclusions That He Is Prepared Deliberately To Distort The Truth, To Close His Eyes And Ears, But Justify His Logic At All Cost.

I Gave Up Caring About Anything, And All The Problems Disappeared. And It Was After That That I Found Out The Truth . I Learnt The Truth Last November On The Third Of November, To Be Precise And I Remember Every Instant Since.

All The Utopias Will Come To Pass Only When We Grow Wings And All People Are Converted Into Angels.

Beauty Is A Terrible And Awful Thing! It Is Terrible Because It Has Not Been Fathomed, For God Sets Us Nothing But Riddles. Here The Boundaries Meet And All Contradictions Exist Side By Side.

If You Happen To Have A Wart On Your Nose Or Forehead, You Cannot Help Imagining That No One In The World Has Anything Else To Do But Stare At Your Wart, Laugh At It, And Condemn You For It, Even Though You Have Discovered America.

Here My Tears Are Falling, Nastenka. Let Them Flow, Let Them Flow - They Don't Hurt Anybody. They Will Dry Nastenka.

Man Grows Used To Everything, The Scoundrel!

Love Is Such A Priceless Treasure That You Can Buy The Whole World With It, And Redeem Not Only Your Own But Other People's Sins. Go, And Do Not Be Afraid.

Humiliate The Reason And Distort The Soul.

There Is Immeasurably More Left Inside Than What Comes Out In Words. Your Thought, Even A Bad One, While It Is With You, Is Always More Profound, But In Words It Is More Ridiculous And Dishonorable.

By The Experience Of Active Love. Strive To Love Your Neighbour Actively And Indefatigably. In As Far As You Advance In Love You Will Grow Surer Of The Reality Of God And Of The Immortality Of Your Soul. If You Attain To Perfect Self-forgetfulness In The Love Of Your Neighbour, Then You Will Believe Without Doubt, And No Doubt Can Possibly Enter Your Soul. This Has Been Tried. This Is Certain.

But Yet I Am Firmly Persuaded That A Great Deal Of Consciousness, Every Sort Of Consciousness, In Fact, Is A Disease.

Two And Two Make Four. Nature Doesn't Ask Your Advice. She Isn't Interested In Your Preferences Or Whether Or Not You Approve Of Her Laws. You Must Accept Nature As She Is With All The Consequences That That Implies.

To Study The Meaning Of Man And Of Life — I Am Making Significant Progress Here. I Have Faith In Myself. Man Is A Mystery: If You Spend Your Entire Life Trying To Puzzle It Out, Then Do Not Say That You Have Wasted Your Time. I Occupy Myself With This Mystery, Because I Want To Be A Man.

It's Curious And Ridiculous How Much The Gaze Of A Prudish And Painfully Chaste Man Touched By Love Can Sometimes Express And That Precisely At A Moment When The Man Would Of Course Sooner Be Glad To Fall Through The Earth Than To Express Anything With A Word Or A Look.

It Is Better To Be Unhappy And Know The Worst, Than To Be Happy In A Fool's Paradise.

There Is Only One Thing That I Dread: Not To Be Worthy Of My Sufferings.

Woe To The Suicides! I Believe That There Can Be None More Miserable Than They. Oh, There Are Some Who Remain Proud And Fierce Even In Hell, In Spite Of Their Certain Knowledge And Contemplation Of The Absolute Truth; There Are Some Fearful Ones Who Have Given Themselves Over To Satan And His Proud Spirit Entirely. For Such, Hell Is Voluntary And Ever Consuming; They Are Tortured By Their Own Choice. For They Have Cursed Themselves, Cursing God And Life. And They Will Burn In The Fire Of Their Own Wrath Forever And Yearn For Death And Annihilation. But They Will Not Attain To Death.

If There Is No God, Everything Is Permitted.

There Is No God

The Sky Was Horribly Dark , But One Could Distinctly See Tattered Clouds , And Between Them Fathomless Black Patches. Suddenly I Noticed In One Of These Patches A Star , And Began Watching It Intently. That Was Because That Star Had Given Me An Idea : I Decided To Kill Myself That Night .

The Mystery Of Human Existence Lies Not In Just Staying Alive, But In Finding Something To Live For.

It Sometimes Happened That You Might Be Familiar With A Man For Several Years Thinking He Was A Wild Animal, And You Would Regard Him With Contempt. And Then Suddenly A Moment Would Arrive When Some Uncontrollable Impulse Would Lay His Soul Bare, And You Would Behold In It Such Riches, Such Sensitivity And Warmth, Such A Vivid Awareness Of Its Own Suffering And The Suffering Of Others, That The Scales Would Fall From Your Eyes And At First You Would Hardly Be Able To Believe What You Had Seen And Heard. The Reverse Also Happens.

If The Person Laughs Well, They Are A Good Person.

Paradise Is Hidden In Each One Of Use, It Is Concealed Within Me Too, Right Now, And If I Wish, It Will Come For Me In Reality, Tomorrow Even, And For The Rest Of My Life.

In Every Idea Of Genius Or In Every New Human Idea, Or, More Simply Still, In Every Serious Human Idea Born In Anyone's Brain, There Is Something That Cannot Possibly Be Conveyed To Others.

But Man Is A Fickle And Disreputable Creature And Perhaps, Like A Chess-player, Is Interested In The Process Of Attaining His Goal Rather Than The Goal Itself.

And Now I Am Eking Out My Days In My Corner, Taunting Myself With The Bitter And Entirely Useless Consolations That An Intelligent Man Cannot Seriously Become Anything; That Only A Fool Can Become Something. Yes, Sir, An Intelligent Nineteenth-century Man Must Be, Is Morally Bound To Be, An Essentially Characterless Creature; And A Man Of Character, A Man Of Action - An Essentially Limited Creature. This Is My Conviction At The Age Of Forty. I Am Forty Now, And Forty Years - Why, It Is All Of A Lifetime, It Is The Deepest Of Old Age. Living Past Forty Is Indecent, Vulgar, Immoral!

Much Unhappiness Has Come Into The World Because Of Bewilderment And Things Left Unsaid.

I Am A Sick Man...i Am A Spiteful Man. I Am An Unattractive Man. I Think My Liver Is Diseased. Then Again, I Don't Know A Thing About My Illness; I'm Not Even Sure What Hurts.

What Tender And Devoted Mother Wouldn't Be Dismayed And Ill With Terror At Her Son's Or Daughter's Stepping Even One Hair's Breath Off The Beaten Track. No, Better Let Him Be Happy And Live In Comfort Without Originality, Is What Every Mother Thinks When She Rocks The Cradle. The Only Person Among Us Who Can Fail To Reach The General's Rank Is The Original Man - In Other Words, The Man Who Won't Be Quiet.

For Example, I'm Terribly Proud. I'm As Mistrustful And As Sensitive As A Hunchback Or A Dwarf; But, In Truth, I've Experienced Some Moments When If Someone Had Slapped My Face, I Might Even Have Been Grateful For It. I'm Being Serious. I Probably Would Have Been Able To Derive A Peculiar Sort Of Pleasure From It-the Pleasure Of Despair, Naturally, But The Most Intense Pleasures Occur In Despair, Especially When You're Very Acutely Aware Of The Hopelessness Of Your Own Predicament.

Destroy My Desires, Eradicate My Ideals, Show Me Something Better, And I Will Follow You.

Something Better

[to Jesus] You Did Not Come Down From The Cross When They Shouted To You, Mocking And Reviling You: "come Down From The Cross And We Will Believe That It Is You." You Did Not Come Down Because, Again, You Did Not Want To Enslave Man By A Miracle And Thirsted For Faith That Is Free, Not Miraculous...i Swear, Man Is Created Weaker And Baser Than You Thought Him! How, How Can He Ever Accomplish The Same Things As You? ...respecting Him Less, You Would Have Demanded Less Of Him, And That Would Be Closer To Love, For His Burden Would Be Lighter.

Because Everyone Is Guilty For Everyone Else. For All The 'wee Ones,' Because There Are Little Children And Big Children. All People Are 'wee Ones.' And I'll Go For All Of Them, Because There Must Be Someone Who Will Go For All Of Them.

A Fool With A Heart And No Sense Is Just As Unhappy As A Fool With Sense And No Heart.

Trifles, Trifles Are What Matter!

I Tell You Solemnly, That I Have Many Times Tried To Become An Insect. But I Was Not Equal Even To That. I Swear, Gentlemen, That To Be Too Conscious Is An Illness — A Real Thorough-going Illness.

I May Be Mistaken But It Seems To Me That A Man May Be Judged By His Laugh, And That If At First Encounter You Like The Laugh Of A Person Completely Unknown To You, You May Say With Assurance That He Is Good.

For Men Are Made For Happiness, And Any One Who Is Completely Happy Has A Right To Say To Himself, 'i Am Doing God's Will On Earth.'

... You Simply Can't Imagine What Men Will Say!

The Chief Thing Is To Love Others Like Yourself, That's The Chief Thing, And That's Everything; Nothing Else Is Wanted - You Will Find Out At Once How To Arrange It All.

Drowning Men, It Is Said, Cling To Wisps Of Straw.

I Drink Because I Wish To Multiply My Sufferings.

The More Stupid One Is, The Closer One Is To Reality. The More Stupid One Is, The Clearer One Is. Stupidity Is Brief And Artless, While Intelligence Squirms And Hides Itself. Intelligence Is Unprincipled, But Stupidity Is Honest And Straightforward.

A True Friend Of Mankind Whose Heart Has But Once Quivered In Compassion Over The Sufferings Of The People, Will Understand And Forgive All The Impassable Alluvial Filth In Which They Are Submerged, And Will Be Able To Discover The Diamonds In The Filth.

There Is No Subject So Old That Something New Cannot Be Said About It.

New Relationship

And Yet I Am Convinced That Man Will Never Give Up True Suffering- That Is, Destruction And Chaos. Why, Suffering Is The Sole Root Of Consciousness.

We Always Imagine Eternity As Something Beyond Our Conception, Something Vast, Vast! But Why Must It Be Vast?

There Are Three Forces, The Only Three Forces Capable Of Conquering And Enslaving Forever The Conscience Of These Weak Rebels In The Interests Of Their Own Happiness. They Are: The Miracle, The Mystery And Authority.

With Love One Can Live Even Without Happiness.

Every Man Looks Out For Himself, And He Has The Happiest Life Who Manages To Hoodwink Himself Best Of All.

Let Us First Fulfill Christ's Injunction Ourselves And Only Then Venture To Expect It Of Our Children. Otherwise We Are Not Fathers, But Enemies Of Our Children, And They Are Not Our Children, But Our Enemies, And We Have Made Them Our Enemies Ourselves.

But How Could You Live And Have No Story To Tell?

I've Long Stopped Worrying About Who Invented Whom - God Man Or Man God.

Loving Someone Is Different From Being In Love With Someone. You Can Hate Someone You're In Love With

You Ache With It All; And The More Mysterious It Is, The More You Ache.

The Formula 'two And Two Make Five' Is Not Without Its Attractions.

Intelligence Alone Is Not Nearly Enough When It Comes To Acting Wisely.

We Do Not Understand That Life Is Paradise, For It Suffices Only To Wish To Understand It, And At Once Paradise Will Appear In Front Of Us In Its Beauty.

It Suddenly Seemed To Me That I Was Lonely, That Everyone Was Forsaking Me And Going Away From Me.

And Though I Suffer For You, Yet It Eases My Heart To Suffer For You.

It Is Easier For A Russian To Become An Atheist, Than For Any Other Nationality In The World. And Not Only Does A Russian 'become An Atheist,' But He Actually Believes In Atheism, Just As Though He Had Found A New Faith, Not Perceiving That He Has Pinned His Faith To A Negation. Such Is Our Anguish Of Thirst!

Drive Nature Out Of The Door And It Will Fly In At The Window

... The More I Learned, The More Conscious Did I Become Of The Fact That I Was Ridiculous. So That For Me My Years Of Hard Work At The University Seem In The End To Have Existed For The Sole Purpose Of Demonstrating And Proving To Me, The More Deeply Engrossed I Became In My Studies, That I Was An Utterly Absurd Person

Only By Self-respect Will You Compel Others To Respect You.

Man Is A Creature That Can Get Accustomed To Anything, And I Think That Is The Best Definition Of Him.

They Have Succeeded In Accumulating A Greater Mass Of Objects, But The Joy In The World Has Grown Less.

...chance May Do Anything.

In Abstract Love Of Humanity One Almost Always Only Loves Oneself.

Humanitarianism

If God Does Not Exist, Everything Is Permitted.

I Agree That Two And Two Make Four Is An Excellent Thing; But To Give Everything Its Due, Two And Two Make Five Is Also A Very Fine Thing.

After All, Bluff And Real Emotion Exist So Easily Side By Side.

I Bless The Rising Sun Each Day, And, As Before, My Heart Sings To Meet It, But Now I Love Even More Its Setting, Its Long Slanting Rays & The Soft Tender Gentle Memories That Come With Them...’ -father Zossima

If God Does Not Exist, Then Everything Is Permissible.

Nothing Has Ever Been More Insupportable For A Man And A Human Society Than Freedom. –the Grand Inquisitor

What Is Hell? I Maintain That It Is The Suffering Of Being Unable To Love.

The Secret Of Man's Being Is Not Only To Live But To Have Something To Live For.

Sometimes We Desire Absolute Nonsense Because In Our Stupidity We See In This Nonsense The Easiest Way Of Attaining Some Conjectural Good.

Nature Doesn't Ask Your Permission; It Doesn't Care About Your Wishes, Or Whether You Like Its Laws Or Not. You're Obliged To Accept It As It Is, And Consequently All Its Results As Well.

It Is Not As A Child That I Believe And Confess Jesus Christ. My Hosanna Is Born Of A Furnace Of Doubt.

I Gave Up Caring About Anything, And All The Problems Disappeared.

Russians Alone Are Able To Combine So Many Opposites In Themselves At One And The Same Time.

Love A Man, Even In His Sin, For That Love Is A Likeness Of The Divine Love, And Is The Summit Of Love On Earth.

Even There, In The Mines, Underground, I May Find A Human Heart In Another Convict And Murderer By My Side, And I May Make Friends With Him, For Even There One May Live And Love And Suffer. One May Thaw And Revive A Frozen Heart In That Convict, One May Wait Upon Him For Years, And At Last Bring Up From The Dark Depths A Lofty Soul, A Feeling, Suffering Creature; One May Bring Forth An Angel, Create A Hero! There Are So Many Of Them, Hundreds Of Them, And We Are All To Blame For Them. [...] If They Drive God From The Earth, We Shall Shelter Him Underground.

To Go Wrong In One's Own Way Is Better Than To Go Right In Someone Else's.

Love Children Especially, For They Too Are Sinless Like The Angels; They Live To Soften And Purify Our Hearts And, As It Were, To Guide Us.

It's The Great Mystery Of Human Life That Old Grief Passes Gradually Into Quiet Tender Joy.

Put Away Your Gods And Come And Worship Ours, Or We Will Kill You And Your Gods!

You See I Kept Asking Myself Then: Why Am I So Stupid That If Others Are Stupid—and I Know They Are—yet I Won't Be Wiser?

She Looked Much Younger Than Her Age, Indeed, Which Is Almost Always The Case With Women Who Retain Serenity Of Spirit, Sensitiveness And Pure Sincere Warmth Of Heart To Old Age.

Coming At Twenty To His Father's House, Which Was A Very Sink Of Filthy Debauchery, He, Chaste And Pure As He Was, Simply Withdrew In Silence When To Look On Was Unbearable, But Without The Slightest Sign Of Contempt Or Condemnation. His Father, Who Had Once Been In A Dependent Position, And So Was Sensitive And Ready To Take Offense, Met Him At First With Distrust And Sullenness.

Remember That You Must Never Sell Your Soul. Never Accept Payment In Advance.... Never Give A Work To The Printer Before It Is Finished. This Is The Worst Thing You Can Do.... It Constitutes The Murder Of Your Own Ideas.

And In Fact You're Not Like Everyone Else: You Weren't Ashamed Just Now To Confess Bad And Even Ridiculous Things About Yourself. Who Would Confess Such Things Nowadays? No One, And People Have Even Stopped Feeling Any Need For Self-judgment.

Where Is It I've Read That Someone Condemned To Death Says Or Thinks, An Hour Before His Death, That If He Had To Live On Some High Rock, On Such A Narrow Ledge That He'd Only Room To Stand, And The Ocean, Everlasting Darkness, Everlasting Solitude, Everlasting Tempest Around Him, If He Had To Remain Standing On A Square Yard Of Space All His Life, A Thousand Years, Eternity, It Were Better To Live So Than To Die At Once. Only To Live, To Live And Live! Life, Whatever It May Be!

To Live Without Hope Is To Cease To Live.

Hoping For The Best

Luxuries Are Easy To Take Up But Very Difficult To Give Up

Here Is A Commandment For You: Seek Happiness In Sorrow. Work, Work Tirelessly.

Life [had] Replaced Logic.

It Seemed Clear To Me That Life And The World Somehow Depended Upon Me Now. I May Almost Say That The World Now Seemed Created For Me Alone: If I Shot Myself The World Would Cease To Be At Least For Me. I Say Nothing Of Its Being Likely That Nothing Will Exist For Anyone When I Am Gone, And That As Soon As My Consciousness Is Extinguished The Whole World Will Vanish Too And Become Void Like A Phantom , As A Mere Appurtenance Of My Consciousness, For Possibly All This World And All These People Are Only Me Myself.

Oh I've Plenty Of Time, My Time Is Entirely My Own.

Every Decent Man Of Our Age Must Be A Coward And A Slave. That Is His Normal Condition. Of That I Am Firmly Persuaded. He Is Made And Constructed To That Very End. And Not Only At The Present Time Owing To Some Casual Circumstance, But Always, At All Times, A Decent Man Is Bound To Be A Coward And A Slave.

... You Can Never Be Sure Of What Has Passed Between Husband And Wife Or Lover And Mistress.

Hold Your Tongue; You Won't Understand Anything. If There Is No God, Then I Am God.

There Is No God

It Is Not The Real Punishment. The Only Effectual One, The Only Deterrent And Softening One, Lies In The Recognition Of Sin By Conscience.

In The End They Will Lay Their Freedom At Our Feet And Say To Us, Make Us Your Slaves, But Feed Us.

Love In Action Is A Harsh And Dreadful Thing Compared With Love In Dreams.

Don’t Be Overwise; Fling Yourself Straight Into Life, Without Deliberation; Don’t Be Afraid - The Flood Will Bear You To The Bank And Set You Safe On Your Feet Again.

Hell Is The Inability To Love.

Inability To Love

I Want To Suffer And Be Purified By Suffering!

Being In Love Doesn't Mean Loving.

What If Man Is Not Really A Scoundrel, Man In General, I Mean, The Whole Race Of Mankind-then All The Rest Is Prejudice, Simply Artificial Terrors And There Are No Barriers And It's All As It Should Be.

To Care Only For Well-being Seems To Me Positively Ill-bred. Whether It’s Good Or Bad, It Is Sometimes Very Pleasant, Too, To Smash Things.

Notes From The Underground

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Esa-Pekka Salonen

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