I could not become anything; neither good nor bad; neither a scoundrel nor an honest man; neither a hero nor an insect. And now I am eking out my days in my corner, taunting myself with the bitter and entirely useless consolation that an intelligent man cannot seriously become anything, that only a fool can become something.
Fyodor DostoevskyAtheism: It seeks to replace in itself the moral power of religion, in order to appease the spiritual thirst of parched humanity and save it; not by Christ, but by force.
Fyodor DostoevskyBut it's precisely in this cold, loathsome half-despair, half-belief, in this deliberate burying of yourself underground for forty years out of sheer pain, in this assiduously constructed, and yet somewhat dubious hopelessness, in all this poision of unfulfilled desires turned inward, this fever of vacillations, of resolutions adopted for eternity, and of repentances a moment later that you find the very essence of that strange, sharp pleasure.
Fyodor DostoevskyAbove all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.
Fyodor DostoevskyAh, Father! Thatโs words and only words! Forgive! If heโd not been run over, heโd have come home today drunk and his only shirt dirty and in rags and heโd have fallen asleep like a log, and I should have been sousing and rinsing till daybreak, washing his rags and the childrenโs and then drying them by the window and as soon as it was daylight I should have been darning them. Whatโs the use of talking forgiveness! I have forgiven as it is!
Fyodor Dostoevsky