Sunday, August 26, 2012

Tolstoy

Despising every power, social and political, which is founded on violence, I am for the individual, and the people have misunderstood me. The government in which I believe is that which is based on the mere moral sanction of men. Buddha, Moses, Plato, Socrates, Christ and Schopenhauer are to me the real sovereigns; for they rule not by force of armies and money, but by moral authority. Just as I hate a hereditary potentate, so do I hate a cheap parliament. A political party has never accomplished anything for humanity. Individuals and geniuses have been the pioneers of every reform and of progress. The real law lives in our hearts. If our hearts are empty, no law or political reform can fill them. 

Leo Tolstoy

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