December 9th: Quotes on Patriotism, from Tolstoy's Calendar of Wisdom

( This introduction is a re-post from November 7th)

 You may have heard of, read, or seen the movies of War and Peace and Anna Karenina, but are you familiar with the last major work of the famous Russian novelist, which he considered to be his greatest masterpiece?

A Calendar of Wisdom: Daily Thoughts to Nourish the Soul was the culmination of Tolstoy’s fifteen-year dream to “collect the wisdom of the centuries in one book.” His first recorded expression of the idea came in 1884; the book was to have “a wise thought for every day of the year, from the greatest philosophers of all times and all people.” However, the collection of wise thoughts grew, so that in this edition there are up to six thoughts on a theme for each day. Tolstoy’s sources for these wise thoughts included Socrates, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Lao-Tzu, Buddha, Pascal, and the New Testament, among others. In addition, he added about eight hundred of his own thoughts, written during his many years of meditation, or taken from his own previous diary entries.

There were three editions published during Tolstoy’s lifetime. After the Russian Revolution, the book was forbidden because of its spiritual orientation and its numerous religious quotes, and was finally republished in 1995 after the democratic reforms. The selections from this first 1995 English translation are taken from the second, most lengthy edition. In his introduction, translator Peter Sekirin states that  “it belongs among the very best creations of human genius, a work which will serve its readers as a practical spiritual guide on how to live in peace with oneself and how to live a life filled with kindness, satisfaction, and happiness.”

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Man's purpose is to serve all mankind, not to serve only one man while doing harm to others.

For a Christian, the love of one's motherland can be an obstacle to the love of one's neighbor.

Lost souls escape their loss of control in patriotism. --Dr. Samuel Johnson

Patriotism is not a virtue. Sacrificing your life for an institution which embodies prejudice cannot be your duty.

People do many bad things for selfish reasons; they do worse things for their families. But they do the worst in the name of patriotism, and they are made proud by these crimes: spying, unduly heavy tax collecting, sacrificing lives, and waging wars.

Loving your country and loving your family are both virtues that can become vices when they become overwhelming and damage your love for your neighbor. 

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A Calendar of Wisdom: Daily Thoughts to Nourish the Soul, Written and Selected from the World’s Sacred Texts by Leo Tolstoy, translated from the Russian by Peter Sekirin; Scribner, New York, 1997.