110+ Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes On Suffering, Soul And Friendship

Fyodor Dostoevsky was a Russian novelist, short story writer, essayist, and philosopher. He is best known for his novels Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and The Brothers Karamazov, which are considered to be some of the greatest works of literature ever written. His works explore the depths of the human soul and often focus on themes of morality, faith, and redemption. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Fyodor Dostoevsky on love, life, suffering.

Top 10 Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes

1. The mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for.
2. If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man ... just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man.
3. What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.
4. The soul is healed by being with children.
5. Learning to love is hard and we pay dearly for it. It takes hard work and a long apprenticeship, for it is not just for a moment that we must learn to love, but forever.
6. Nothing in this world is harder than speaking the truth, nothing easier than flattery.
7. People speak sometimes about the "bestial" cruelty of man, but that is terribly unjust and offensive to beasts, no animal could ever be so cruel as a man, so artfully, so artistically cruel.
8. It takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently.
9. I think the devil doesn't exist, but man has created him, he has created him in his own image and likeness.
10. It is better to be unhappy and know the worst, than to be happy in a fool's paradise.

Fyodor Dostoevsky Image Quotes

The soul is healed by being with children. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If everything on earth were rational, nothing would happen. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

But how could you live and have no story to tell? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To love is to suffer and there can be no love otherwise. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Short Quotes

• The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he's in prison.
• Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.
• If everything on earth were rational, nothing would happen.
• Man has it all in his hands, and it all slips through his fingers from sheer cowardice.
• The more incompetent one feels, the more eager he is to fight.
• The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month.
• I believe the best definition of man is the ungrateful biped.
• You will burn and you will burn out; you will be healed and come back again.
• There is immeasurably more left inside than what comes out in words.
• I am a sick man...I am a spiteful man. An unattractive man. I think that my liver hurts.

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Love

The darker the night, the brighter the stars, The deeper the grief, the closer is God! — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you perceive it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an all-embracing love. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

There is no sin , and there can be no sin on all the earth , which the Lord will not forgive to the truly repentant! Man cannot commit a sin so great as to exhaust the infinite love of God . Can there be a sin which could exceed the love of God? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Above 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 Dostoevsky

The more you succeed in loving, the more you'll be convinced at the existence of God and the immortality of your soul. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If you love all things, you will also attain the divine mystery that is in all things. For then your ability to perceive the truth will grow every day, and your mind will open itself to an all-embracing love — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To love is to suffer and there can be no love otherwise. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

But men love abstract reasoning and neat systematization so much that they think nothing of distorting the truth, closing their eyes and ears to contrary evidence to preserve their logical constructions. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To be in love is not the same as loving. You can be in love with a woman and still hate her. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Life

Don’t be overwise; fling yourself straight into life, without deliberation; don’t be afraid - the flood will bear you to the bank and set you safe on your feet again. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Perhaps I really regard myself as an intelligent man only because throughout my entire life I've never been able to start or finish anything. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Humanity can live without science, it can live without bread, but it cannot live without beauty. Without beauty, there would be nothing left to do in this life. Here the secret lies. Here lies the entire story. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything? Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To study the meaning of man and of life — I am making significant progress here. I have faith in myself. Man is a mystery: if you spend your entire life trying to puzzle it out, then do not say that you have wasted your time. I occupy myself with this mystery, because I want to be a man. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I am a dreamer. I know so little of real life that I just can’t help re-living such moments as these in my dreams, for such moments are something I have very rarely experienced. I am going to dream about you the whole night, the whole week, the whole year. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

There is nothing higher and stronger and more wholesome and useful for life in later years than some good memory, especially a memory connected with childhood, with home. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

My life is ending, I know that well, but every day that is left me I feel how my earthly life is in touch with a new infinite, unknown, but approaching life, the nearness of which sets my soul quivering with rapture, my mind glowing and my heart weeping with joy. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

And if there's love, you can do without happiness too. Even with sorrow, life is sweet. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

When I look back at the past and think of all the time I squandered in error and idleness,... then my heart bleeds. Life is a gift... every minute could have been an eternity of happiness! If only youth knew! Now my life will change; now I will be reborn. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Suffering

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Nothing is more seductive for a man than his freedom of conscience, but nothing is a greater cause of suffering. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Suffering is part and parcel of extensive intelligence and a feeling heart. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If he has a conscience he will suffer for his mistake. That will be his punishment-as well as the prison. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

A true friend of mankind whose heart has but once quivered in compassion over the sufferings of the people, will understand and forgive all the impassable alluvial filth in which they are submerged, and will be able to discover the diamonds in the filth. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Break what must be broken, once for all, that's all, and take the suffering on oneself. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

For broad understanding and deep feeling, you need pain and suffering. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I did not bow down to you, I bowed down to all the suffering of humanity. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

There is only one thing that I dread: not to be worthy of my sufferings. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Suffering is the sole origin of consciousness. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Soul

My soul bleeds and the blood steadily, silently, disturbingly slowly, swallows me whole. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man, don't bother analyzing his ways of being silent, of talking, of weeping, of seeing how much he is moved by noble ideas; you will get better results if you just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The Russian soul is a dark place. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Humiliate the reason and distort the soul. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

For I love the empress of my soul. I love and I cannot but love. You yourself see the whole of me. I shall fly to her, fall down before her: you were right to walk past me.. farewell and forget your victim, never trouble yourself more! — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I have seen the truth. It is not as though I had invented it in my mind. I have seen it, SEEN IT and the living image of it has filled my soul forever. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

My sweetheart! When I think of you, it's as if I'm holding some healing balm to my sick soul, and although i suffer for you, i find that even suffering for you is easy. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

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. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Remember that you must never sell your soul. Never accept payment in advance.... Never give a work to the printer before it is finished. This is the worst thing you can do.... It constitutes the murder of your own ideas. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Existential

But how could you live and have no story to tell? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Existentialism isn't so atheistic that it wears itself out showing that God doesn't exist. Rather, it declares that even if God did exist, that would change nothing. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

It wasn't the New World that mattered... Columbus died almost without seeing it; and not really knowing what he had discovered. It's life that matters, nothing but life - the process of discovering, the everlasting and perpetual process, not the discovery itself, at all. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About World

I don't need money, or, better, it's not money that I need; it's not even power; I need only what is obtained by power and simply cannot be obtained without power: the solitary and calm awareness of strength! That is the fullest definition of freedom, which the world so struggles over! — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Lack of originality, everywhere, all over the world, from time immemorial, has always been considered the foremost quality and the recommendation of the active, efficient and practical man. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Love is such a priceless treasure that you can buy the whole world with it, and redeem not only your own but other people's sins. Go, and do not be afraid. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

At some thoughts one stands perplexed, especially at the sight of men's sin, and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that once for all, you may subdue the whole world. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery of things. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If you happen to have a wart on your nose or forehead, you cannot help imagining that no one in the world has anything else to do but stare at your wart, laugh at it, and condemn you for it, even though you have discovered America. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The world stands on absurdities, and without them perhaps nothing at all would happen. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Quotes About Accept

Men do not accept their prophets and slay them, but they love their martyrs and worship those whom they have tortured to death. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Nature doesn't ask your permission; it doesn't care about your wishes, or whether you like its laws or not. You're obliged to accept it as it is, and consequently all its results as well. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

It’s not God that I don’t accept, Alyosha, only I most respectfully return him the ticket. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Two and two make four. Nature doesn't ask your advice. She isn't interested in your preferences or whether or not you approve of her laws. You must accept nature as she is with all the consequences that that implies. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Or renounce life altogether! Accept fate obediently as it is, once and for all, and stifle everything in myself, renouncing any right to act, to live, to love. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

You must accept it as it is, and hence accept all consequences. A wall is indeed a wall. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

It’s not God that I do not accept, you understand, it is this world of God’s, created by God, that I do not accept and cannot agree to accept. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Accept suffering and achieve atonement through it — that is what you must do. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

He seemed, indeed, to accept everything without the least condemnation though often grieving bitterly. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I do not rebel against my God, I simply do not accept his world. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky Famous Quotes And Sayings

The soul is healed by being with children. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

You are told a lot about your education, but some beautiful, sacred memory, preserved since childhood, is perhaps the best education of all. If a man carries many such memories into life with him, he is saved for the rest of his days. And even if only one good memory is left in our hearts, it may also be the instrument of our salvation one day. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

When I look back on my past and think how much time I wasted on nothing, how much time has been lost in futilities, errors, laziness, incapacity to live; how little I appreciated it, how many times I sinned against my heart and soul-then my heart bleeds. Life is a gift, life is happiness, every minute can be an eternity of happiness. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The most offensive is not their lying - one can always forgive lying - lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to truth - what is offensive is that they lie and worship their own lying. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

She looked much younger than her age, indeed, which is almost always the case with women who retain serenity of spirit, sensitiveness and pure sincere warmth of heart to old age. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

We sometimes encounter people, even perfect strangers, who begin to interest us at first sight, somehow suddenly, all at once, before a word has been spoken. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

But how could you live and have no story to tell? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

They tease me now, telling me it was only a dream. But does it matter whether it was a dream or reality, if the dream made known to me the truth? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Reason and Knowledge have always played a secondary, subordinate, auxiliary role in the life of peoples, and this will always be the case. A people is shaped and driven forward by an entirely different kind of force, one which commands and coerces them and the origin of which is obscure and inexplicable despite the reality of its presence. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To love is to suffer and there can be no love otherwise. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If one wanted to crush and destroy a man entirely, to mete out to him the most terrible punishment, all one would have to do would be to make him do work that was completely and utterly devoid of usefulness and meaning. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

My friend, the truth is always implausible, did you know that? To make the truth more plausible, it's absolutely necessary to mix a bit of falsehood with it. People have always done so. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If you want to be respected by others, the great thing is to respect yourself. Only by that, only by self-respect will you compel others to respect you. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

A cultivated and decent man cannot be vain without setting a fearfully high standard for himself, and without despising and almost hating himself at certain moments. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I can see the sun, but even if I cannot see the sun, I know that it exists. And to know that the sun is there - that is living. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Every blade of grass, every insect, ant, and golden bee, all so amazingly know their path, though they have not intelligence, they bear witness to the mystery of God and continually accomplish it themselves. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The world says: "You have needs - satisfy them. You have as much right as the rich and the mighty. Don't hesitate to satisfy your needs; indeed, expand your needs and demand more." This is the worldly doctrine of today. And they believe that this is freedom. The result for the rich is isolation and suicide, for the poor, envy and murder. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

He was one of the numerous and varied legion of dullards, of half-animated abortions, conceited, half-educated coxcombs, who attach themselves to the idea most in fashion only to vulgarize it and who caricature every cause they serve, however sincerely. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Man is fond of counting his troubles, but he does not count his joys. If he counted them up as he ought to, he would see that every lot has enough happiness provided for it. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

By interpreting freedom as the propagation and immediate gratification of needs, people distort their own nature, for they engender in themselves a multitude of pointless and foolish desires, habits, and incongruous stratagems. Their lives are motivated only by mutual envy, sensuality, and ostentation. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To go wrong in one's own way is better than to go right in someone else's. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from the faith. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Let us not forget that the reasons for human actions are usually incalculably more complex and diverse than we tend to explain them later, and are seldom clearly manifest. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The death of a child is the greatest reason to doubt the existence of God. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

What man wants is simply independent choice, whatever that independence may cost and wherever it may lead. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

People really do like seeing their best friends humiliated; a large part of the friendship is based on humiliation; and that is an old truth,well known to all intelligent people. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The more I detest men individually the more ardent becomes my love for humanity. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To love someone means to see him as God intended him. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

One can know a man from his laugh, and if you like a man's laugh before you know anything of him, you may confidently say that he is a good man. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Above all, don't lie to yourself. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and devil are fighting there, and the battlefield is the heart of man. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The secret of man's being is not only to live but to have something to live for. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

May you be for ever blessed for that moment of bliss and happiness which you gave to another lonely and grateful heart. Isn't such a moment sufficient for the whole of one's life? — Fyodor Dostoevsky

They wanted to speak, but could not; tears stood in their eyes. They were both pale and thin; but those sick pale faces were bright with the dawn of a new future, of a full resurrection into a new life. They were renewed by love; the heart of each held infinite sources of life for the heart of the other. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

They were renewed by love; the heart of each held infinite sources of life for the heart of the other. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Reality is infinitely diverse, compared with even the subtlest conclusions of abstract thought, and does not allow of clear-cut and sweeping distinctions. Reality resists classification. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

People with new ideas, people with the faintest capacity for saying something new, are extremely few in number, extraordinarily so, in fact. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Besides, nowadays, almost all capable people are terribly afraid of being ridiculous, and are miserable because of it. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Times of crisis, of disruption or constructive change, are not only predictable, but desirable. They mean growth. Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I've always considered myself smarter than everyone around me, and sometimes, believe me, I've been ashamed of it. At the least, all my life I've looked away and never could look people straight in the eye. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

It is not as a child that I believe and confess Jesus Christ. My hosanna is born of a furnace of doubt. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

To begin with unlimited freedom is to end with unlimited despotism. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Totally without hope one cannot live. To live without hope is to cease to live. Hell is hopelessness. It is no accident that above the entrance to Dante's hell is the inscription: "Leave behind all hope, you who enter here." — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Since man cannot live without miracles, he will provide himself with miracles of his own making. He will believe in witchcraft and sorcery, even though he may otherwise be a heretic, an atheist, and a rebel. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Believe to the end, even if all men went astray and you were left the only one faithful; bring your offering even then and praise God in your loneliness. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

There are things which a man is afraid to tell even to himself, and every decent man has a number of such things stored away in his mind. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

I've long stopped worrying about who invented whom - God man or man God. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find someone to worship. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

A new philosophy, a new way of life, is not given for nothing. It has to be paid dearly for and only acquired with much patience and great effort — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Compassion is the chief law of human existence. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

If I seem happy to you . . . You could never say anything that would please me more. For men are made for happiness, and anyone who is completely happy has a right to say to himself, 'I am doing God's will on earth.' All the righteous, all the saints, all the holy martyrs were happy. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Man has such a predilection for systems and abstract deductions that he is ready to distort the truth intentionally he is ready to deny the evidence of his senses only to justify his logic. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first moment, before a word is spoken. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Only by self-respect will you compel others to respect you. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it may be! — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Power is given only to those who dare to lower themselves and pick it up. Only one thing matters, one thing; to be able to dare! — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Talking nonsense is man's only privilege that distinguishes him from all other organisms. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Drive nature out of the door and it will fly in at the window — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Life Lessons by Fyodor Dostoevsky

1. Fyodor Dostoevsky emphasizes the importance of understanding and accepting the darkness within us in order to reach our full potential. He encourages us to be honest with ourselves and to strive for a meaningful life.
2. Dostoevsky's works emphasize the power of compassion and understanding in order to create meaningful relationships and to build a better society. He encourages us to be kind and understanding to those around us, regardless of their differences.
3. Dostoevsky teaches us to be mindful of our actions and to have faith in ourselves and our abilities. He encourages us to take risks and to never give up on our dreams.