Don't you forget what's divine in the Russian soul and that's resignation.

You can't, in sound morals, condemn a man for taking care of his own integrity. It is his clear duty.

The real significance of crime is in its being a breach of faith with the community of mankind.

I let him run on, this papier-maché Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.

For a moment I had a view of a world that seemed to wear a vast and dismal aspect of disorder, while, in truth, thanks to our unwearied efforts, it is as sunny an arrangement of small conveniences as the mind of man can conceive.

They were conquerors, and for that you want only brute force--nothing to boast of, when you have it, since your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others.

I couldn't have felt more of lonely desolation somehow, had I been robbed of a belief or had missed my destiny in life.