133 quotes
It is better to be unhappy and know the worst, than to be happy in a fool's paradise!
The Idiot (1868)
Who consciously throws himself into the water or onto the knife?
The Idiot (1868)
A woman would deceive the all-seeing eye itself.
A woman is incapable of complete remorse.
It is not as a child that I believe and confess Jesus Christ. My hosanna is born of a furnace of doubt.
It seemed clear to me that life and the world somehow depended upon me now.
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man (1877)
Love is such a priceless treasure that you can redeem the whole world by it, and cleanse not only your own sins but the sins of others.
The Brothers Karamazov (1879)
To care only for well-being seems to me positively ill-bred. Whether it's good or bad, it is sometimes very pleasant, too, to smash things.
Notes from Underground (1864)
I think that the principal and most basic spiritual need of the Russian People is the need for suffering, incessant and unslakeable suffering, everywhere and in everything.
Pass by us, and forgive us our happiness.
The Idiot (1868)
Beauty is a terrible and awful thing! It is terrible because it has not been fathomed, for God sets us nothing but riddles.
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.
I occupy myself with this mystery, because I want to be a man.
Personal correspondence (1839)
The chief thing is to love others like yourself, that's the chief thing, and that's everything; nothing else is wanted — you will find out at once how to arrange it all.
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man (1877)
My feelings, gratitude, for instance, are denied me simply because of my social position.
The Brothers Karamazov (1879)
Humiliate the reason and distort the soul...
The Idiot (1868)
Love children especially, for like the angels they too are sinless, and they live to soften and purify our hearts, and, as it were, to guide us. Woe to him who offends a child.
The Brothers Karamazov (1879)
In most cases, people, even the most vicious, are much more naive and simple-minded than we assume them to be. And this is true of ourselves too.
The Brothers Karamazov (1879)
It is written ' Thou shalt not kill,' so because he has killed, are we to kill him? No, that's impossible.
The Idiot: A Novel in Four Parts (1916)
It's chemistry, brother, chemistry! There's no help for it, your reverence, you must make way for chemistry.