Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky > Quotes

“It is only by guaranteeing liberty to our opponents that we can secure our own”
― Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky, Nihilism As It Is, Being Stepniak's Pamphlets and Felix Volkhovsky's Claims of the Russian Liberals

“Their is certain pleasure in thinking of afflictions when they have lost their sting and become things of past.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“A woman's love is a great, but dangerous blessing.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“He disliked trouble of any kind, taking life as easy as it was possible for him, and preferring always to smooth over or cautiously circumvent all obstacles instead of breaking through them.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“Life is a struggle. The closest ties are no shield against this.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“He was not born to be a martyr- he knew it only too well and it pained him to hurt even a dumb creature. But frightful, necessity over which he had no control, compelled him to trample down his feelings”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“To first write on politics, and then come forward as a novelist has its inconveniences, as I had to learn at my own expense. It is like appearing in two different characters in the same play: the spectators will always have some difficulty in discarding the impression they may have received from the first while looking at the second.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“But Nature has denied him any literary talent. He felt within him an ardent enthusiastic soul; he was far from being insensible to what was beautiful and poetical. But the channels between his sentiments and their utterance were blocked in him, and things which profoundly stirred his heart, when set down on paper, looked savourless and commonplace.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“And the model Nihilist, the Nihilist of Turgheneff, will be troubled by that look which knows nothing of compromise; for the enthusiasm and faith that animated him in the early years of the struggle have vanished with victory”
― Stepniak Stepniak, Underground Russia: Revolutionary Profiles and Sketches From Life

“Woman are subjugated through love. Every time, therefore, that she arises to claim her rights, it is only natural that she should commence by asking for the liberty of love”
― Stepniak Stepniak, Underground Russia: Revolutionary Profiles and Sketches From Life

“It is when spoken man to man, face to face, that the human word produces its greatest effect.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“You mustn't rave in this way," she said, earnestly. "A woman's love is not a prize; it's a free gift on both sides.”
― S. Stepniak, The Career of a Nihilist

“The fundamental principle of Nihilism, properly so-called, was absolute individualism. It was the negation, in the name of individual liberty, of all the obligations imposed upon the individual by society, by family life, and by religion. Nihilism was a passionate and powerful reaction, not against political despotism, but against the moral despotism that weighs upon the private and inner life of the individual.”
― Sergius Stepniak, Underground Russia: Revolutionary Profiles And Sketches From Life