Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes

If there is no God, everything is permitted.

When reason fails, the devil helps!

I utter what you would not dare think

And it is so simple... The one thing is - love thy neighbor as thyself - that is the one thing. That is all, nothing else is needed. You will instantly find how to live.

For what is man without desires, without free will, and without the power of choice but a stop in an organ pipe?

Speak of a wolf and you see his tail!

A just cause is not ruined by a few mistakes.

To achieve perfection, one must first begin by not understanding many things! And if we understand too quickly, we may not understand well.

I am crazy about mysterious things.

For a woman, all resurrection, all salvation, from whatever perdition, lies in love; in fact, it is her only way to it.

In sinning, each man sins against all, and each man is at least partly guilt for another's sin. There is no isolated sin.

Every man needs a place to go to.

My God, but what do I care about the laws of nature and arithmatic if for some reason these laws and two times two is four are not to my liking?

But what are years, what are months!" he would exclaim. "Why count the days, when even one day is enough for man to know all happiness.

After all, bluff and real emotion exist so easily side by side.

But to fall in love does not mean to love. One can fall in love and still hate.

There is not a thing that is more positive than bread.

Being at a loss to resolve these questions, I am resolved to leave them without any resolution.

There is nothing more alluring to man than freedom of conscience, but neither is there anything more agonizing.

We don't understand that life is heaven, for we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep.

And so in that very shame I suddenly begin a hymn.

It is always so, when we are unhappy we feel more strongly the unhappiness of others; our feeling is not shattered, but becomes concentrated.

Beauty will save the world

How does it come about that what an intelligent man expresses is much stupider than what remains inside him?

To be too conscious is an illness. A real thorough going illness.

What does reason know? Reason only knows what it has succeeded in learning.

Man is stupid, phenomenally stupid.

What matters," said the prince at last, "is that you have a child's trusting nature and extraordinary truthfulness. Do you know that a great deal can be forgiven you for that alone?

Actions are sometimes performed in a masterly and most cunning way, while the direction of the actions is deranged and dependent on various morbid impressions - it's like a dream.

But what can a decent man speak of with most pleasure? Answer: Of himself. Well, so I will talk about myself.

Even as I approach the gambling hall, as soon as I hear, two rooms away, the jingle of money poured out on the table, I almost go into convulsions.

"I love mankind," he said, "but I find to my amazement that the more I love mankind as a whole, the less I love man in particular."

I am a ridiculous man. They call me a madman now. That would be a distinct rise in my social position were it not that they still regard me as being as ridiculous as ever.

On our earth we can only love withsuffering and through suffering.

If the people around you are spiteful and callous and will not hear you, fall down before them and beg their forgiveness; for in truth you are to blame for their not wanting to hear you.

Every man has some reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends.

Trifles, trifles are what matter!

You’re a gentleman,” they used to say to him. “You shouldn’t have gone murdering people with a hatchet; that’s no occupation for a gentleman.

Sometimes a man is intensely, even passionately, attached to suffering — that is a fact.

Oh, if only I did nothing simply as a result of laziness.

Happiness lies not in happiness but only in the attempt to achieve it.

Hang your merit. I don't seek anyone's approbation.

Just take a look around you: Blood is flowing in rivers and in such a jolly way you’d think it was champagne.

The meanest and most hateful thing about money is that it even gives one talent.

I cannot understand why the world is arranged as it is.

--you wouldn't have hurt me like this for nothing. So what have I done? How have I wronged you? Tell me.

Love every leaf, every ray of light. Love the animals, love the plants, love each separate thing. Loving all, you will perceive the mystery of God in all.

Lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to truth.

And, indeed, I will at this point ask an idle question on my own account: which is better — cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?

I almost do not exist now and I know it; God knows what lives in me in place of me.