Despite the fact that the doctors treated him, bled him, and gave him medicines to drink, he recovered.
[sometimes quoted as "Though the doctors treated him, let his blood, and gave him medications to drink, he nevertheless recovered."]" - Meaning and context.">
Bk. XV, ch. 12

Despite the fact that the doctors treated him, bled him, and gave him medicines to drink, he recovered.
[sometimes quoted as "Though the doctors treated him, let his blood, and gave him medications to drink, he nevertheless recovered."]

— Leo Tolstoy

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "Despite the fact that the doctors treated him, bled him, and gave him medicines to drink, he recovered.
[sometimes quoted as "Though the doctors treated him, let his blood, and gave him medications to drink, he nevertheless recovered."]" in the context of "Bk. XV, ch. 12" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Leo Tolstoy" (Quotes, War and Peace (1865–1867; 1869): (Full text online)) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
Leo Tolstoy

About Leo Tolstoy

Lev Nikolayevitch Tolstoy Ле́в Никола́евич Толсто́й, usually rendered Leo Tolstoy, or sometimes Tolstoi (9 September 1828 – 20 November 1910) was a Russian writer, philosopher and social activist (social critic), whose novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina are internationally praised classics of world literature. He was a major influence on the development of Christian anarchism and pacifism, contributing to such nonviolent resistance movements as those of Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and James Bevel.