Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Do a man dirt, yourself you hurt.

All is in a man's hands and he lets it all slip from cowardice, that's an axiom. It would be interesting to know what it is men are most afraid of. Taking a new step, uttering a new word is what they fear most.

And now once again I asked myself the question: do I love her? And once more I could not answer, that is to say, again, for the hundredth time, I answered that I hated her.

"You're a gentleman," they used to say to him. "You shouldn't have gone murdering people with a hatchet; that's no occupation for a gentleman."

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

Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel.

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

Nothing in the world is harder than speaking the truth and nothing easier than flattery. If there’s the hundredth part of a false note in speaking the truth, it leads to a discord, and that leads to trouble. But if all, to the last note, is false in flattery, it is just as agreeable, and is heard not without satisfaction. It may be a coarse satisfaction, but still a satisfaction. And however coarse the flattery, at least half will be sure to seem true. That’s so for all stages of development and classes of society.