Quotes About Selfishness

The state is the great fiction by which everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else.

But there is also another tendency that is common among people. When they can, they wish to live and prosper at the expense of others.

The bump of ego on his skull had swollen large, so he saw the whole world in terms of what it could give him.

Notons qu'un soi-disant "sociobiologiste"-- ce mot est tout un programme -- a poussé l'ingéniosité jusqu'à remplacer la matière par des "gênes" dont l'égoïsme aveugle, combiné avec un instinct de fourmis ou d'abeilles, aurait fini par constituer non seulement les corps mais aussi la conscience et en fin de compte l'intelligence humaine, miraculeusement capable de disserter sur les gênes qui se sont amusés à la produire.

let us note that a so-called "Sociobiologist" - this word is a whole project by itself - pushed the ingeniosity to the point of replacing matter by "genes", whose egoist selfishness, combined with ant and bee instincts, would have managed to constitute not only bodies but also conscience and at the end, human intelligence, miraculously able to dissert on the genes that amusingly created it.

We always tend to think we can become happier by getting what we want, even if that means we have to make someone else suffer.

I find it a challenge to respect capable people who care only for their own interests.

I was coming to realize something very difficult. I was slowly accepting that the way I did things – the way my people did things – might not actually be the best way. In other words, I was feeling humility. I sincerely hope that you never have to feel this emotion. Like asparagus and fish, it's not really as good for you as everyone says it is. Selfishness, arrogance, and callousness got me much further than humility ever did

Wellington, Jack had never cared about pleasing anyone but himself. Lord Geoffrey, his spendthrift, gamester father and Lord Foxhaven's second son, had died when Jack was but eight. Two years later, his mother married Sir Findlay Branch, a wealthy, stuffy baronet whose apparent mission in life was to eradicate Lord Geoffrey's

As we come to grips with our own selfishness and stupidity, we make friends with the impostor and accept that we are impoverished and broken and realize that, if we were not, we would be God. The art of gentleness toward ourselves leads to being gentle with others -- and is a natural prerequisite for our presence to God in prayer.

There were some types of men whose wilfulness thrived on the excuses that were made for them. And they were the kind of people who never knew when they had gone far enough in their selfishness, who never knew when to stop. The more allowances that were made for them, the more they presumed.

Men are often childish and vain, although they deny it. - Marianne Falk

Vous avez reconnu l'autre jour que votre amour n'était pas d'une qualité bien fameuse, puisque vous préfériez votre bonheur au mien.

Philanthropy is almost the only virtue which is sufficiently appreciated by mankind. Nay, it is overrated; and it is our selfishness which overrates it.

One of the maxims which the devil, in a late visit upon earth, left to his disciples, is, when once you are got up, to kick the stool from under you. In plain English, when you have made your fortune by the good offices of a friend, you are advised to discard him as soon as you can.

Yes, there will be situations when you may need to be a little selfish, but it is better to find the right balance.

If you have a mental model that says big corporations are fundamentally greedy and selfish and exploitative, you don't really want to have an exception to that model. It's much easier to say, 'Yes, Whole Foods has been corrupted.'

If I had children, I would be very selfish. I wouldn't be out doing things. But by not having kids, it makes me freer to travel the world and talk about things I feel are important.

There are many individuals, companies and even countries operating in what I call a 'me first' mentality, which is effectively a purely competitive approach to life, treating the planet as if it has infinite resources and pitting one country against another for supremacy.

I have never understood why it is "greed" to want to keep the money you have earned but not greed to want to take somebody else's money.

It is greed to do all the talking but not to want to listen at all.

We're a part of nature. As we destroy nature, we destroy ourselves. It's a selfish thing to want to protect nature.

Focus on yourself -- do what you want, when you want, without having to consider anyone else's agenda.

Natural man's sin is precisely this: He wants the benefits of God without God Himself.