Family Happiness and Other Stories Quotes

“And I, too, am the same… only there is no love in my heart, or desire for love, no interest in work, not contentment in myself. And how remote and impossible my old religious enthusiasms seem now… and my former abounding life! What once seemed so plain and right – that happiness lay in living for others – is unintelligible now. Why live for others, when life has not attractions even for oneself?”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“He was right in saying that the only certain happiness in life is to live for other...I have lived through much, and now I think I have found what is needed for happiness. A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easily to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor - such is my idea of happiness. And then, on top of all that, you for a mate, and children, perhaps - what more can the heart of a man desire?”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“Was ich wünschte, war Bewegung und nicht ein ruhiges Dahinfließen des Lebens. Es verlangte mich nach Aufregungen und Gefahren, nach Selbstaufopferung um eines Gefühlswillen. In mir war ein Überschuss von Kraft, der in unserem stillen Leben keinen Raum zur Bestätigung fand”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“It's a bad sort of young lady who's only alive when she's being admired, and as soon as she's alone lets herself go altogether and finds no charm in anything - who's all for show, and nothing for herself.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“Spring had come. My former depression had completely gone, and was replaced by the dreamy spring melancholy of vague hopes and desires.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“It's a conflict of generosity. Isn't that what you call family happiness?”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories

“Tisztán, világosan éreztem, élni azért kell, hogy az ember boldog legyen,...
(Családi boldogság)”
― Leo Tolstoy, Family Happiness and Other Stories