I am now and have always been a stranger to the realm of practical matters.

For the salvation of his soul the Muslim digs a well. It would be a fine thing if each of us were to leave behind a school, or a well, or something of the sort, so that life would not pass by and retreat into eternity without a trace.

Even in Siberia there is happiness.

...and with a burning pain in my heart I realized how unnecessary, how petty, and how deceptive all that had hindered us from loving was. I understood that when you love you must either, in your reasonings about that love, start from what is highest, from what is more important than happiness or unhappiness, sin or virtue in their accepted meaning, or you must not reason at all.

The world perishes not from bandits and fires, but from hatred, hostility, and all these petty squabbles.

Then I feel so happy and at the same time so sad, it's unimaginable.

In all the universe nothing remains permanent and unchanged but the spirit.