Quotes About Selflessness

I am speaking now of the highest duty we owe our friends, the noblest, the most sacred--that of keeping their own nobleness, goodness, pure and incorrupt...If we let our friend become cold and selfish and exacting without remonstrance, we are no true lover, no true friend.

O, that's what troubles me, papa. You want me to live so happy, and never to have any pain,—never suffer anything,—not even hear a sad story, when other poor creatures have nothing but pain and sorrow, all their lives,—it seems selfish. I ought to know such things, I ought to feel about them!

Ah, brave, manly heart,—smothering thine own sorrow, to comfort thy beloved ones!

My dad and mom believed that you do what you have to do in private and don't make a big deal out of it. Just try to help people as much as you can.

All altruism springs from putting yourself in the other person's place.

It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.

We must remember that the test of our religious principles lies not just in what we say, not only in our prayers, not even in living blameless lives - but in what we do for others

I would rather be a Medal of Honor recipient then the President of the United States!

He who helps in the saving of others, saves himself as well.

You can only apprehend the infinite by entering into a state in which you are finite self no longer.

For your love given ask no return, none. To love you must love to love.

Love isn't about how a person makes me feel but how I treat them.

I tend to make my joy a private experience and hoard all the fruit for myself, forgetting that the tree doesn't eat its own fruit but presents it to others.

The beauty of the God girl is that she isn't about "me" all the time.

If of thy mortal goods thou art bereft, And from thy slender store two loaves alone to thee are left, Sell one, and with the dole Buy hyacinths to feed thy soul. Attributed to the Gulistan of Moslih Eddin Saadi

But why must man suffer and sacrifice for God? At the end of his suffering and sacrifice he will find that though he began to do so for God, it has proved to be for himself. It is the foolishly selfish who is selfish, and the wisely selfish proves to be selfless.

Dying is this: When there is a fruit or something sweet or good to taste, the child comes to it's mother and says "Will you give it to me?" Although it would have given pleasure to the mother to eat it, she gives it to the child. The eating of it by the child is enjoyed by the mother. That is death. She enjoys her life in the joy of another. Those who rejoice in the joy of another at their own expense have taken the first step towards true life.

Miss Cameron, you are quite something, you know. Marriage doesn't mean a damn thing to you. You don't, in the least, mind selling your own soul for Cameron Hall. But what of mine? What if I were in love with someone?

Anthony is far too besotted a fool, Kiernan," Jesse said bluntly. "He hasn't been making love to you in dark corners. He allows you to dangle him along at your whim and asks for nothing in return but one of those devastating smiles. Well, I'm not Anthony, Kiernan. I love you, but my mind is my own, and I cannot change what I see as right or wrong for you or for anyone else. Do you understand that?

Even after all this time, the sun never says, 'You owe me.' Look what happens with a love like that. It lights the whole world.

Was he really meant to give up his own life to care for her every hour of the day? Had he really signed up for that?

Who will sacrifice nothing, and enjoy all, is a fool.

The appalling thing is the degree of charity women are capable of. You see it all the time... love lavished on absolute fools. Love's a charity ward, you know.

One should be so absorbed in prayer that one is no longer aware of one's own self. There is nothing for such a person but the flow of Life; all one's thoughts are with God. One who still knows how intensely one is praying has not yet overcome the bonds of self