When Turgenev pleaded with him to return to the literary art that had first won him fame, he did not understand that for Tolstoy the measure of true greatness was not what we were but what we strove to be in the ceaseless struggle to achieve moral perfection. Nor did Turgenev comprehend that the same magnificent qualities that made Tolstoy’s art immortal — his sincerity and love of truth — were the very qualities that drove him on in his religious and social mission.
—Ernest J. Simmons, Introduction to Tolstoy’s Writings
…the perfection pointed out by Christ is infinite and can never be attained; and Christ gives His teaching with this in view, that complete perfection will never be attained, but that the striving toward complete, infinite perfection will constantly increase the good of men, and that this good can, therefore, be increased infinitely.
—Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You
Mohandas Gandhi
