Inspirational Quotes by Fyodor Dostoevsky

“It’s just the same story as a doctor once told me,” observed the elder. “He was a man getting on in years, and undoubtedly clever. He spoke as frankly as you, though in jest, in bitter jest. ‘I love humanity,’ he said, ‘but I wonder at myself. The more I love humanity in general, the less I love man in particular. In my dreams,’ he said, ‘I have often come to making enthusiastic schemes for the service of humanity, and perhaps I might actually have faced crucifixion if it had been suddenly necessary; and yet I am incapable of living in the same room with any one for two days together, as I know by experience. As soon as any one is near me, his personality disturbs my self-complacency and restricts my freedom. In twenty-four hours I begin to hate the best of men: one because he’s too long over his dinner; another because he has a cold and keeps on blowing his nose. I become hostile to people the moment they come close to me. But it has always happened that the more I detest men individually the more ardent becomes my love for humanity.’ ”

“That is a fact and it speaks, it shouts, for itself… but when it comes to inner feelings, that’s quite a different matter, gentlemen.”

“Othello was not jealous, he was trustful,” observed Pushkin.”

“Sappiate che non esiste nulla di più elevato e di più forte, e di più sano, e di più utile per la vita che vi attende di un qualche bel ricordo, soprattutto se questo ricordo viene dall’infanzia, dalla casa in cui si è nati. Vi si parla molto della vostra educazione, ma forse un qualche ricordo meraviglioso, sacro, conservato dall’infanzia rappresenta davvero la migliore educazione. Se a un uomo è dato raccogliere tanti di questi ricordi nel corso della sua vita, egli allora per tutta la vita è salvo. E anche se un solo buon ricordo resterà con noi nel nostro cuore, anch’esso può in qualche modo servire per la nostra salvezza”

“أيها الإنسان المقدس جدا , اسمح لي أن أقبل يدك العزيزة اللطيفة مرة أخرى , ذلك أن المرء يستطيع أن يتفاهم معك دون أن يفقد حبه للحياة وإقباله عليها و ميله إليها , لا تظنن أنني أكذب هكذا طول الوقت وأنني لست إلا مهرجا , الحق أنني فعلت هذا عمدا من البداية إلى النهاية , فعلته عمدا لأختبرك و أمتحنك ! لقد أردت أن أتأكد أنك رجل انساني , و من أن شخصي الهين يمكن أن يؤكد ذاته من دون أن يصدم كبريائك . في وسعي الآن أن أشهد لك شهادة جميلة : إن في وسع الأنسان أن يتنفس في حضورك”

“I am an honorable man. A man who has done many vile, despicable things, but an honorable man nevertheless. I don’t know how to explain it to you, but most of the trouble in my life has come precisely from my yearning to be honorable.”

“çok bilen çabuk ihtiyarlar.”

“No, not about Diderot. Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himself without love he gives way to passions and coarse pleasures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himself. The man who lies to himself can be more easily offended than anyone. You know it is sometimes very pleasant to take offence, isn't it? A man may know that nobody has insulted him, but that he has invented the insult for himself, has lied and exaggerated to make it picturesque, has caught at a word and made a mountain out of a molehill- he knows that himself, yet he will be the first to take offence, and will revel in his resentment till he feels great pleasure in it, and so pass to genuine vindictiveness.”

“What seems to you bad within you will grow purer from the very fact of your observing it in yourself.”

“Give a map of the heavens”, he wrote, “to a Russian schoolboy who has never heard of such a map before, and he’ll return it to you the next day full of corrections.” No knowledge and limitless presumptuousness—that’s what the German meant to say about Russian schoolboys.”

“Maximov, a landowner of Tula. He at once entered into our”

“I become a misanthrope, he said, the minute I come into contact with people. And it has always been the same with me; the more I have detested people individually, the more passionately I have loved humanity in general.”

“My young brother asked forgiveness of the birds: it seems senseless, yet it is right, for all is like an ocean, all flows and connects; touch it in one place and it echoes at the other end of the world. Let it be madness to ask forgiveness of the birds, still it would be easier for the birds, and for a child, and for any animal near you, if you yourself were more gracious than you are now, if only by a drop, still it would be easier. All is like an ocean, I say to you. Tormented by universal love, you, too, would then start praying to the birds, as if in a sort of ecstasy, and entreat them to forgive you your sin. Cherish this ecstasy, however senseless it may seem to people.”

“Perhaps God was moved by the tears of someone praying for me, perhaps the entreaties of my late mother, perhaps a heavenly spirit who came to my rescue—I don’t know, but the devil was defeated.”

“If you are penitent, you love.”

“The more you succeed in loving, the more you’ll be convinced of the existence”

“Ellos también sufren, y mucho, sin duda para expiar la falta de sus padres, que han comido el fruto prohibido... Pero estos razonamientos son de otro mundo que el corazón humano no puede comprender desde aquí abajo. Un ser inocente no es capaz de sufrir por otro, y menos una tierna criatura.”

“fear, too, though fear is only the consequence of every sort of falsehood.”

“se debe amar la vida por encima de todo.”

“لأنّ الإنسان الشاذ ، ليس حتما-ليس دائما- ذلك الذي يسلك سبيل الخصوص والتفرّد ، حتى لقد يتّفق ، خلافاً لهذا ، أن يحمل في ذاته حقيقة عصره ، بينما يكون الناس ، جميع الناس ، من معاصريه ، قد ابتعدوا عن هذه الحقيقة إلى حين ، كأنما دفعتهم عنها ريحٌ هبّت على حين فجأة...”