quotations about desire
Nothing is more human than for man to desire naturally things impossible to his nature. It is, indeed, the property of a nature which is not closed up in matter like the nature of physical things, but which is intellectual or infinitized by the spirit. It is the property of a metaphysical nature. Such desires reach for the infinite, because the intellect thirsts for being and being is infinite.
JACQUES MARITAIN
Approaches to God
Man is the only animal whose desires increase as they are fed; the only animal that is never satisfied.
HENRY GEORGE
Progress and Poverty
Weak desires bring weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat.
NAPOLEON HILL
Think and Grow Rich
We are encouraged to believe, for example, that there are consensual objects of desire, that every man wants a certain woman. Well, actually, every man doesn't want that certain woman. The really frightening thing about desire is how idiosyncratic it is. We may desire people whom we might not like, or want, or whom other people might not think beautiful. So idiosyncratic is it that we want to pool this feeling, foreclose it, into consensual objects. The culture is encouraging the belief that there's more consensus than there in fact is.
ADAM PHILLIPS
Bomb Magazine, fall 2010
How is the anxious soul of man befool'd in his desire,
That thinks an hectic fever may be cool'd in flames of fire?
FRANCIS QUARLES
Emblems
What is it men in women to require?
The lineaments of gratified desire.
What is it women do in men require?
The lineaments of gratified desire.
WILLIAM BLAKE
Gnomic Verses
The strong desires of man's insatiate breast may stand possess'd
Of all that earth can give; but earth can give no rest.
FRANCIS QUARLES
Emblems
When you believe, or are led to believe, you are unable to act upon the greatest desires of the soul, the result is mental and spiritual enslavement.
IYANLA VANZANT
Acts of Faith
Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.
MARCUS AURELIUS
Meditations
Do not desire what you can't acquire.
KEN ALSTAD
Savvy Sayin's
Men over-estimate what they desire
Through ignorance of it: credulous Pursuit
Thinks his betrothed, Possession, is divine;
But finds she is a mortal like himself.
HENRY ABBEY
"Karagwe"
And desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets.
BIBLE
Ecclesiastes 12:5
A single spark of occasion discharges the child of passions into a thousand crackers of desire.
JOHANN CASPAR LAVATER
Aphorisms on Man
Paired opposites define your longings and those longings imprison you.
FRANK HERBERT
Chapterhouse: Dune
Forbid us something, and that thing we desire; but press it on us hard, and we will flee.
GEOFFREY CHAUCER
The Canterbury Tales
People know what they want because they know what other people want.
THEODOR W. ADORNO
Minima Moralia
Ignore what a man desires and you ignore the very source of his power.
WALTER LIPPMANN
A Preface to Politics
There's a wall between you and what you want and you got to leap it.
BOB DYLAN
"Groom's Still Waiting at the Altar"
While we desire, we do not enjoy; and with enjoyment desire ceases.
WILLIAM HAZLITT
Characteristics
If wishes were fishes we'd all cast nets.
FRANK HERBERT
Dune