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People without firmness of character love to make up a fate for themselves; that relieves them of the necessity of having their own will and of taking responsibility for themselves.

Ivan Turgenev

What’s terrible is that there’s nothing terrible, that the very essence of life is petty, uninteresting, and degradingly trite.
IVAN TURGENEV

Degrade Essence Life Terrible
I’ve become convinced that every person should treat himself strictly and even rudely and distrustfully; it’s difficult to tame the beast in oneself.
IVAN TURGENEV

Convince Difficult Oneself Person Treat
I never started from ideas but always from character.
IVAN TURGENEV

Character Ideas Myself Start
Nature cares nothing for logic, our human logic: she has her own, which we do not recognize and do not acknowledge until we are crushed under its wheel.
IVAN TURGENEV

Acknowledgement Care Crush Human Logic Nature Recognition
He was the soul of politeness to everyone — to some with a hint of aversion, to others with a hint of respect.
IVAN TURGENEV

Himself Polite Respect Soul
What a magnificent body, how I should like to see it on the dissecting table.
IVAN TURGENEV

Body Myself Table
Don’t force me into saying what I don’t want to say, and what I won’t say.
IVAN TURGENEV

Force Myself Talk
I was as happy as a fish in water, and I could have stayed in that room for ever, have never left that place.
IVAN TURGENEV

Happiness Myself Place Room Stay Water
So many memories and so little worth remembering, and in front of me – a long, long road without a goal.
IVAN TURGENEV

Goal Memories Myself Worth
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.
IVAN TURGENEV

Alone Bad Existence Fact Myself
The word tomorrow was invented for indecisive people and for children.
IVAN TURGENEV

Children Indecision People Word
What did I hope for, what did I expect, what rich future did I foresee, when the phantom of my first love, rising up for an instant, barely called forth one sigh, one mournful sentiment?
IVAN TURGENEV

Expectation Future Hope Instant Mourn Oneself Rise
I only know that I feel tired, antiquated; I feel as though I had been living a long, long time.
IVAN TURGENEV

Feeling Live Myself Time
We sit in the mud and reach for the stars.
IVAN TURGENEV

Reach Stars
Great God, grant that twice two be not four.
IVAN TURGENEV

God Greatness Mathematics
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.
IVAN TURGENEV

Creation Destroy Nature Right

People without firmness of character love to make up a fate for themselves; that relieves them of the necessity of having their own will and of taking responsibility for themselves.

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People without firmness of character love to make up a fate for themselves; that relieves them of the necessity of having their own will and of taking responsibility for themselves.

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