quotations about pleasure
Everybody's looking for a reason to live
If you're looking for a reason
I've a reason to give
Pleasure, little treasure
DEPECHE MODE
"Pleasure, Little Treasure"
Pleasure is a crumbling statue.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
Pleasure is not shameful, not even neutral; it is sacred. The act of consciously receiving pleasure connects our awareness to the very pulse of life through the senses, and in doing so, honors the divine.
JENA LA FLAMME
Pleasurable Weight Loss
Pleasure, like a kind of bait, is thrown before everything which is really bad, and easily allures greedy souls to the hook of perdition.
EPICTETUS
Fragments
Men seek but one thing in life--their pleasure.... You rear like a frightened colt, because I use a word to which your Christianity ascribes a deprecatory meaning. You have a hierarchy of values; pleasure is at the bottom of the ladder, and you speak with a little thrill of self-satisfaction, of duty, charity, and truthfulness. You think pleasure is only of the senses; the wretched slaves who manufactured your morality despised a satisfaction which they had small means of enjoying. You would not be so frightened if I had spoken of happiness instead of pleasure: it sounds less shocking, and your mind wanders from the sty of Epicurus to his garden. But I will speak of pleasure, for I see that men aim at that, and I do not know that they aim at happiness. It is pleasure that lurks in the practice of every one of your virtues. Man performs actions because they are good for him, and when they are good for other people as well they are thought virtuous: if he finds pleasure in giving alms he is charitable; if he finds pleasure in helping others he is benevolent; if he finds pleasure in working for society he is public-spirited; but it is for your private pleasure that you give twopence to a beggar as much as it is for my private pleasure that I drink another whiskey and soda. I, less of a humbug than you, neither applaud myself for my pleasure nor demand your admiration.
W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM
Of Human Bondage
Many know how to please, but know not when they have ceased to give pleasure.
ARTHUR HELPS
Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd
Pleasure is life, and pain is death.
MINOT JUDSON SAVAGE
Light on the Cloud
During the course of our life we now and then enjoy some pleasures so inviting, and have some encounters of so tender a nature, that though they are forbidden, it is but natural to wish that they were at least allowable. Nothing can be more delightful, except it be to abandon them for virtue's sake.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
Past pleasures are of as little comfort to a man as the money in his neighbor's pocket.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
Pleasure is a river running to the sea; happiness is the full, calm sea.
PETER KREEFT
Heaven: The Heart's Deepest Longing
Pleasure is the flower that fades, remembrance is the lasting perfume.
BRUCE LEE
Jeet Kune Do: Bruce Lee's Commentaries on the Martial Way
So what do we know about the pursuit of pleasure compared to the pursuit of meaningful activities that also foster engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment? Can the seeking of pleasure alone lead to psychological well-being? Research shows that engagement and meaning are significantly related to well-being, whereas pleasure is negatively related to objective well-being, including things like education, achievement, and the absence of mental disorders. Engagement and meaning contribute more to well-being than pleasure, because they help people build resources that are valuable. Seeking pleasure provides a short-term reward but does not provide further skill or resource development.
JENNIFER W. SHEWMAKER
Sexualized Media Messages and Our Children
The excess of delight palls our appetites rather than pleases.
WELLINS CALCOTT
Thoughts Moral and Divine
Pleasure is nought but virtue's gayer name--
I wrong her still, I rate her worth too low:
Virtue the root, and pleasure is the flow'r.
EDWARD YOUNG
The Complaint
We ought to aim at such pleasures as follow labor, not at those which precede it.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
When happiness was a matter of pleasure, and pleasure a matter of taste, one could be happy simply by rolling in filth.
DARRIN M. MCMAHON
Happiness: A History
Every act by which pleasure is reaped, without any result of pain, is pure gain to happiness; every act whose results of pain are less than the results of pleasure, is good, to the extent of the balance in favour of happiness.
JEREMY BENTHAM
Deontology
For the rational, psychologically healthy man, the desire for pleasure is the desire to celebrate his control over reality. For the neurotic, the desire for pleasure is the desire to escape from reality.
AYN RAND
The Virtue of Selfishness
For, without love, pleasure withers quickly, becomes a foul taste on the palate, and pleasure's inventions are soon exhausted.
JAMES BALDWIN
Just Above My Head
Passive pleasure is no pleasure at all.
ARTHUR ADAMOV
Ping Pong