Fyodor Dostoyevsky Quotes
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151. “My life is ending, I know that well, but every day that is left me I feel how my earthly life is in touch with a new infinite, unknown, but approaching life, the nearness of which sets my soul quivering with rapture, my mind glowing and my heart weeping with joy.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

152. “I’m a master of speaking silently – all my life I’ve spoken silently and I’ve lived through entire tragedies in silence.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

153. “And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which is better – cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

154. “Wealth is the number of things one can do without.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

155. “It was a wonderful night, such a night as is only possible when we are young, dear reader.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

156. “I believe there is no one deeper, lovelier, more sympathetic and more perfect than Jesus...”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

157. “People talk sometimes of a bestial cruelty, but that’s a great injustice and insult to the beasts; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically cruel. The tiger only tears and gnaws, that’s all he can do. He would never think of nailing people by the ears, even if he were able to do it.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

158. “Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

159. “It’s in despair that you find the sharpest pleasures, particularly when you are most acutely aware of the hopelessness of your position.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

160. “Intelligence alone is not nearly enough when it comes to acting wisely.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

161. “Don’t be like everyone else, even if you are the only one.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

162. “With love one can live even without happiness.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

163. “Man is unhappy because he doesn’t know he’s happy. If anyone finds out he’ll become happy at once.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

165. “There is immeasurably more left inside than what comes out in words.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

166. “Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

167. “I swear to you, sirs, that excessive consciousness is a disease – a genuine, absolute disease.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

168. “It’s the moon that makes it so still, weaving some mystery.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

169. “Interpreting freedom as the multiplication and rapid satisfaction of desires, men distort their own nature, for many senseless and foolish desires and habits and ridiculous fancies are fostered in them.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

170. “In every man’s memories there are such things as he will reveal not to everyone, but perhaps only to friends. There are also such as he will reveal not even to friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. Then, finally, there are such as a man is afraid to reveal even to himself, and every decent man will have accumulated quite a few things of this sort.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

171. “In the realist, faith is not born from miracles, but miracles from faith.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

172. “The more incompetent one feels, the more eager he is to fight.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

174. “For, after all, you do grow up, you do outgrow your ideals, which turn to dust and ashes, which are shattered into fragments; and if you have no other life, you just have to build one up out of these fragments.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

175. “Tyranny is a habit which may be developed until at last it becomes a disease. I declare that the noblest nature can become so hardened and bestial that nothing distinguishes it from that of a wild animal. Blood and power intoxicate; they help to develop callousness and debauchery.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

176. “The man who is happy is fulfilling the purpose of existence.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

177. “It is not the brains that matter most, but that which guides them – the character, the heart, generous qualities, progressive ideas.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

178. “If someone proved to me that Christ is outside the truth, and that in reality the truth were outside of Christ, then I should prefer to remain with Christ rather than with the truth.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

180. “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?”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

181. “Nothing is more seductive for a man than his freedom of conscience, but nothing is a greater cause of suffering.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

182. “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.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

183. “Neither a person nor a nation can exist without some higher idea. And there is only one higher idea on earth, and it is the idea of the immortality of the human soul, for all other “higher” ideas of life by which humans might live derive from that idea alone.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

184. “There is a crack in my soul, and I can hear it trembling, quivering, stirring deep inside me.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

186. “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.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

187. “One can know a man from his laugh, and if you like a man’s laugh before you know anything of him, you may confidently say that he is a good man.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

188. “Since man cannot live without miracles, he will provide himself with miracles of his own making. He will believe in witchcraft and sorcery, even though he may otherwise be a heretic, an atheist, and a rebel.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

189. “Realists do not fear the results of their study.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

190. “Whoever steps on the lowest step will surely step on the highest.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

191. “If I had had the power to prevent my own birth I should certainly never have consented to accept existence under such ridiculous conditions.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

192. “Talking nonsense is man’s only privilege that distinguishes him from all other organisms.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

194. “Everything will come in due course, if you have the gumption to wait for it.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

195. “Was it all put into words, or did both understand that they had the same thing at heart and in their minds, so that there was no need to speak of it aloud, and better not to speak of it?”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

196. “Never mind a little dirt, if the goal is splendid!”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

197. “Nature does not ask your permission, she has nothing to do with your wishes, and whether you like her laws or dislike them, you are bound to accept her as she is, and consequently all her conclusions.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

198. “If man has one good memory to go by, that may be enough to save him.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

199. “God has such gladness every time he sees from heaven that a sinner is praying to Him with all his heart, as a mother has when she sees the first smile on her baby’s face.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

200. “Don’t think I’m talking nonsense because I’m drunk. I’m not a bit drunk. Brandy’s all very well, but I need two bottles to make me drunk.”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky