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Leo Tolstoy Quotes about Greatness

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When it is impossible to stretch the very elastic threads of historical ratiocination any farther, when actions are clearly contrary to all that humanity calls right or even just, the historians produce a saving

When it is impossible to stretch the very elastic threads of historical ratiocination any farther, when actions are clearly contrary to all that humanity calls right or even just, the historians produce a saving conception of 'greatness.' 'Greatness,' it seems, excludes the standards of right and wrong. For the 'great' man nothing is wrong, there is no atrocity for which a 'great' man can be blamed.

Leo Tolstoy
Greatness, Men, Humanity
Leo Tolstoy (2016). “War and Peace”, p.1125, First Avenue Editions

For us, with the rule of right and wrong given us by Christ, there is nothing for which we have no standard. And there is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth.

Leo Tolstoy
Truth, Greatness, Simplicity
Leo Tolstoy “War and Peace: Designed to be Read as a Modern Novel”

In historic events, the so-called great men are labels giving names to events, and like labels they have but the smallest connection with the event itself. Every act of theirs, which appears to them an act of their own will, is in an historical sense involuntary and is related to the whole course of history and predestined from eternity.

Leo Tolstoy
Greatness, Men, Names
War and Peace bk. 9, ch. 1 (1865 - 1869) (translation by Louise and Aylmer Maude)

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