Inspirational Quotes by Fyodor Dostoevsky

“Although throughout these painful moments it had never occurred to him to seek guidance from religion, now that his decision coincided - so he thought - with the requirements of religion, the fact of there being a religious sanction for his decision gave him entire satisfaction and some comfort.”

“O youth! youth! you have no concerns, you possess, as it were, all the treasures of the universe, even grief is a comfort to you, even sadness suits your looks, you are self-assured and bold, you say: 'Look, I'm the only one alive!' while the very days of your life run away and vanish without a trace and without number and everything in you disappears like wax, like snow in the hear of the sun... And perhaps the entire et of your charm consists not in the possibility of doing everything, but in the possibility of thinking perhaps it consists precisely in the fact that you want only to scatter on the wind energies that you wouldn't know how to use for anything else, perhaps it consists in the fact that each one of us seriously regards himself as a spendthrift and seriously considers that he has the right to say: 'Oh, the things I could have done if only I hadn't wasted my time!”

“When did anybody ever sell anything without being told immediately after the sale, 'It was worth much more'? But when one wants to sell, no one will give anything….”

“Demek ki, mutluluğun yerinde daha büyük mutluluk, bütün aşkların üzerinde aralıksız, sonsuz ve sürekli artacak olan başka bir aşk vardı!”

“women are the pivot on which everything turns!”

“...pe atunci traiam fara grija, faceam ce voiam, infloream, intr-un cuvant. Pe atunci nu-mi trecea prin cap ca omul nu e o planta si ca nu poate inflori multa vreme.”

“Would she cry, and wish that she had the right to put her arms around his neck and comfort him?”

“Then she fell back exhausted, for these transports of vague love wearied her more than great debauchery.”

“At the fact that I’m unable to think up a situation in which life would not be suffering, that we’re all created in order to suffer, and that we all know it and keep thinking up ways of deceiving ourselves. But if you see the truth, what can you do?”

“He looked at Sonia and felt how great was her love for him, and strange to say he felt it suddenly burdensome and painful to be so loved. Yes, it was a strange and awful sensation!”

“the irrepressible, quivering brilliance of her eyes and her smile set him on fire”

“I must tell vou, Gavril Ardalionovitch,” Mvshkin said suddenly, “that I was once so ill that I really was almost an idiot; but I’ve got over that long ago, and so I rather dislike it when people call me an idiot to my face. Though I can excuse it in you in consideration of your ill-luck, but in your vexation you’ve been abusive to me twice already. I don’t like that at all, especially so suddenly at first acquaintance; and so, as we are just at the crossroads, hadn’t we better part? You go to the right to your home, and I go to the left. I’ve got twenty-five roubles, and I shall be sure to find some lodging-house.”

“The old lady whirled round, and snatched her skirts out of danger. The lad fled on the instant, scrambled up the high board-fence, and disappeared over it. His aunt Polly stood surprised a moment, and then broke into a gentle laugh.”

“It seemed to each of them that the life he led himself was the only real life, and the life led by his friend was a mere phantasm.”

“If you look for perfection, you will never be content.”

“The liberal party said, or rather allowed it to be understood, that religion is only a curb to keep in check the barbarous classes of the people; and Stepan Arkadyevitch could not get through even a short service without his legs aching from standing up, and could never make out what was the object of all the terrible and high-flown language about another world when life might be so very amusing in this world.”

“Occasionally there came gusts of winds, breezes from the sea rolling in one sweep over the whole plateau of the Caux country, which brought even to these fields a salt freshness. The rushes, close to the ground, whistled; the branches trembled in a swift rustling, while their summits, ceaselessly swaying, kept up a deep murmur.”

“I understand," said the notary; "a man of science can't be worried with the practical details of life.”

“The most mediocre libertine has dreamed of sultanas; every notary bears within him the debris of a poet.”

“All that spring he was not himself and lived through terrible moments. "Without knowing what I am and why I’m here, it is impossible for me to live. And I cannot know that, therefore I cannot live," Levin would say to himself.”