Art begins when a man, with a purpose of communicating to other people a feeling he once experienced, calls it up again within himself and expresses it by certain external signs.
Leo TolstoyRead
If goodness has causes, it is not goodness; if it has effects, a reward, it is not goodness either. So goodness is outside the chain of cause and effect.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Goodness exists independently of any external validation or consequences.
In this quote, Tolstoy argues that true goodness cannot be tied to specific outcomes or rewards, nor can it be seen as a reaction to certain causes. His perspective suggests that genuine goodness is an intrinsic quality that operates beyond conventional notions of cause and effect, highlighting a moral framework where acts of kindness or virtue hold value in themselves rather than for any gain they might yield.
Themes
GoodnessVirtueMoralityPhilosophySelflessness
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech about altruism, this quote could reinforce the idea that true acts of kindness are valuable without expecting anything in return.
More from Leo Tolstoy
All quotes →Pierre looked into the sky, into the depths of the retreating, twinkling stars. "And all this is mine, and all this is in me, and all this is me!" thought Pierre. "And all this they've caught and put in a shed and boarded it up!
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People try to do all sorts of clever and difficult things to improve life instead of doing the simplest, easiest thing-refusing to participate in activities that make life bad.
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It's too easy to criticize a man when he's out of favour, and to make him shoulder the blame for everybody else's mistakes.
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Music is the shorthand of emotion. Emotions, which let themselves be described in words with such difficulty, are directly conveyed to man in music, and in that is its power and significance.
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A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor — such is my idea of happiness.
Leo TolstoyRead
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