One may speak about anything on earth with fire, with enthusiasm, with ecstasy, but one only speaks about oneself with avidity.
IVAN TURGENEVBelonging to oneself–the whole essence of life lies in that.
More Ivan Turgenev Quotes
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Love, I thought, is stronger than death or the fear of death. Only by it, by love, life holds together and advances.
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Nothing is worse and more hurtful than a happiness that comes too late. It can give no pleasure, yet it deprives you of that most precious of rights – the right to swear and curse at your fate!
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We Russians have assigned ourselves no other task in life but the cultivation of our own personalities, and when we’re barely past childhood, we set to work to cultivate them, those unfortunate personalities.
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What’s terrible is that there’s nothing terrible, that the very essence of life is petty, uninteresting, and degradingly trite.
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Nature creates while destroying, and doesn’t care whether it creates or destroys as long as life isn’t extinguished, as long as death doesn’t lose its rights.
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Everyone needs help from everyone else.
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There are some moments in life, some feelings; one can only point to them and pass by.
IVAN TURGENEV -
I do not know what the heart of a bad man is like. But i do know what the heart of a good man is like. And it is terrible.
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Go forward while you can, but if your strength fails you, sit down near the road and gaze without anger or envy at those who pass by. They don’t have far to go, either.
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I’m through with Tolstoy. He has ceased to exist for me…. If I eat a bowl of soup and like it, I know by that fact alone and with absolute certainty that Tolstoy will find it bad, and vice versa.
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Great God, grant that twice two be not four.
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We’re young, we’re not monsters, no fools: we’ll conquer happiness for ourselves.
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I was afraid of looking into my heart…afraid of thinking seriously about anything…I did not want to know whether I was loved, and I did not want to admit to myself that I was not loved.
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The word tomorrow was invented for indecisive people and for children.
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Don’t force me into saying what I don’t want to say, and what I won’t say.
IVAN TURGENEV