I've never been in love. I've dreamt of it day and night, but my heart is like a fine piano no one can play because the key is lost. - Anton Chekhov

Whoever sincerely believes that elevated and distant goals are as little use to man as a cow, that “all of our problems” come from such goals, is left to eat, drink, sleep, or, when he gets sick of that, to run up to a chest and smash his forehead on its corner.

It always seems to the brothers and the father that their brother or son didn't marry the right person.

No matter how corrupt and unjust a convict may be, he loves fairness more than anything else. If the people placed over him are unfair, from year to year he lapses into an embittered state characterized by an extreme lack of faith.