Quotes About Passions

Doubtless criticism was originally benignant, pointing out the beauties of a work rather that its defects. The passions of men have made it malignant, as a bad heart of Procrustes turned the bed, the symbol of repose, into an instrument of torture.

Every man had his personal habits, passions, and impulses toward goodness, beauty, and truth.

I tell you for the last time: turn all your attention to yourself, lay chains upon your feelings, and seek blessedness not in passions but in your own heart...the source of blessedness is not outside, but inside us...

Let me give you a piece of advice: Leo Tolstoy is not the only human being on this planet. Yet all I ever hear you talking about is Leo Tolstoy . . . (tr Benjamin Sher)

Life meanwhile—real life, with its essential interests of health and sickness, toil and rest, and its intellectual interests in thought, science, poetry, music, love, friendship, hatred, and passions—went on as usual, independently of and apart from political friendship or enmity with Napoleon Bonaparte and from all the schemes of reconstruction.

The violent but narrow passions that pass under the name of patriotism are not the noblest forms of human and social emotions. The world, or the people who, unfortunately, have most to say in governing the world, believe no such thing, and will not believe it when the representatives of States meet again to decide how to fill up the graves which they helped dig in Europe.

It is impossible to anticipate all of the misdeeds engendered by the universal conflict of human passions. They multiply at a compound rate with the growth in population and the interlacing of particular interests that cannot be directed with geometrical precision towards the public utility.

In the past, catharsis was the purification of the passions by fire. Today it is their liquidation by flow.

What I can claim is that no other work of mine depicts virtue with greater prominence: here the slightest misdemeanour is severely punished; the mere thought of wrongdoing is viewed with as much horror as the enactment of it; lapses that derive from love are treated as absolute failings; the passions are represented only to demonstrate the destructive anarchy to which they give rise; and vice is everywhere portrayed in colours which cause its ugliness to be known for what it is and abhorred.

The sword wears out its sheath, as it is sometimes said. That is my story. My passions have made me live, and my passions have killed me. What passions, it may be asked. Trifles, the most childish things in the world. Yet they affected me as much as if the possessions of Helen, or the throne of the Universe, had been at stake.

if you study in order to instruct, and herbalize only to become author or professor, all its attractive charms vanish, and plants, being no longer considered but as instruments of our passions, no more real pleasure can result from the study of them. Our end, then, is not to gain knowledge, but to make others sensible of our acquirements;

The continual emotion that is felt in the theater excites us, enervates us, enfeebles us, and makes us less able to resist our passions. And the sterile interest taken in virtue serves only to satisfy our vanity without obliging us to practice it.

Politiek onderscheid leidt noodzakelijkerwijs tot onderscheid tussen de burgers. De toenemende ongelijkheid tussen het volk en zijn leiders doet zich weldra ook voelen tussen de individuen, en neemt naar gelang de hartstochten, talenten en omstandigheden duizend gedaanten aan.

It is by the activity of our passions, that our reason improves: we covet knowledge merely because we covet enjoyment, and it is impossible to conceive why a man exempt from fears and desires should take the trouble to reason.

On the other hand, nothing would have been so miserable as savage man, dazzled by enlightenment, tormented by passions, and reasoning about a state different from his own.

IN order to discover the rules of society best suited to nations, a superior intelligence beholding all the passions of men without experiencing any of them would be needed.

Liberado de todas las pasiones terrenas que engendra el tumulto de la vida social, mi alma se elevaría frecuentemente por encima de esta atmósfera, y comerciaría por anticipado con las inteligencias celestes cuyo número espera ir a aumentar dentro de poco.

La espada gasta la vaina, dice el proverbio. He aquí mi historia. He vivido de mis pasiones y mis pasiones me han matado.

D'où vient la faiblesse de l'homme ? De l'inégalité qui se trouve entre sa force et ses désirs. Ce sont nos passions qui nous rendent faibles, parce qu'il faudrait pour les contenter plus de forces que ne nous en donna la nature. Diminuez donc les désirs, c'est comme si vous augmentiez les forces : celui qui peut plus qu'il ne désire en a de reste ; il est certainement un être très fort.

Jamás he conocido las pasiones más odiosas, nunca ha invadido mi corazón la envidia, la maldad, ni la venganza... en ocasiones la ira, pero no soy muy hábil y jamás guardo rencor.

But the end is there, transforming everything. For us, the man is already the hero of the story. His moroseness, his money troubles are much more precious than ours, they are all gilded by the light of future passions.

I think people figure out early in their lives what currency they can work in.

It's hard to have a film and television career and do music work at the same time.

I believe we have become paralyzed, paralyzed by our desire to be loved. Now our founding fathers had the wisdom to know that social acceptance and popularity were fleeing, and that this country's principles needed to be rooted in strengths greater than the passions and the emotions of the times.