Count Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910)

In the last year of his life, Count Leo Tolstoy was subjected to unusual stresses. He was frequently ill with fevers, stomach ailments, constipation, and colds. His long-time marriage to Sofia Andreyevna was characterized by hysteria and mutual recriminations. Finally, his estate at Yasnaya Polyanka was constantly besieged with friends, relatives, petitioners, crackpots, and celebrity hounds. Yet, in his Diaries, he managed to keep his eyes on the main topics, as this entry on May 1, 1910, the last year of his life attests::

One of the main causes of suicides in the European world is the false teaching of the Christian Church about heaven and hell. People don’t believe in heaven and hell, but all the same the idea that life should be either heaven or hell is so firmly fixed in their heads that it doesn’t permit of a rational understanding of life as it is—namely neither heaven nor hell, but struggle, unceasing struggle, unceasing because life consists only of struggle; only not a Darwinian struggle of creatures and individuals, but a struggle of spiritual forces against their bodily restrictions. Life is a struggle of the soul against the body. If life is understood in this way, suicide is impossible, unnecessary and senseless. The good is only to be found in life. I seek the good; how then could I leave this life in order to attain the good? I seek mushrooms. Mushrooms are only to be found in the forest. How then can I leave the forest in order to find mushrooms?