On our earth we can only love withsuffering and through suffering.

Man is a mystery. It needs to be unravelled, and if you spend your whole life unravelling it, don't say that you've wasted time. I am studying that mystery because I want to be a human being.

I think everyone must love life more than anything else in the world.' 'Love life more than the meaning of it?' 'Yes, certainly. Love it regardless of logic, as you say. Yes, most certainly regardless of logic, for only then will I grasp its meaning. That's what I've been vaguely aware of for a long time. Half your work is done, Ivan: you love life. Now you must try to do the second half and you are saved.

It is better to be unhappy and know the worst, than to be happy in a fool's paradise.

And, indeed, I will at this point ask an idle question on my own account: which is better — cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?

Sometimes a man is intensely, even passionately, attached to suffering — that is a fact.

Is it really not possible to touch the gaming table without being instantly infected by superstition?