quotations about pleasure
Past pleasures are of as little comfort to a man as the money in his neighbor's pocket.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
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
We ought to aim at such pleasures as follow labor, not at those which precede it.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
Passing pleasures do but cloy,
And ape the consciousness of joy:
The wine, the women, and the song,
That tempt us here by night,
Are happy things, though not for long,
To wing oblivious flight
Above the dull, resenting pain,
That, waking, seizes on the brain,
And gives the moody fibre food
To mope, or captiously to brood,
With swollen eyes and torpid legs,
O'er foul and discontented dregs.
Ah! the quiet that did pall
Before I drank indulgence blind
Becomes the panacea in all
I seek, yet, seeking, cannot find.
WILLIAM BATCHELDER GREENE
"Passing Pleasures", Imogen and Other Poems
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
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
Oh my meters running so I got to go now
It's the pleasure principle oh oh ohh
It's the principle of pleasure, ohh
It's the pleasure principle oh oh
JANET JACKSON
"The Pleasure Principle"
The excess of delight palls our appetites rather than pleases.
WELLINS CALCOTT
Thoughts Moral and Divine
Many know how to please, but know not when they have ceased to give pleasure.
ARTHUR HELPS
Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd
We are prone to seek immediate pleasure or good, however small, rather than remote pleasure or good, however vast.
HORACE MANN
Thoughts
Pleasure is the flower that fades, remembrance is the lasting perfume.
BRUCE LEE
Jeet Kune Do: Bruce Lee's Commentaries on the Martial Way
Pleasure is life, and pain is death.
MINOT JUDSON SAVAGE
Light on the Cloud
He who takes his fill of every pleasure ... becomes depraved; while he who avoids all pleasures alike ... becomes insensible.
ARISTOTLE
Nicomachean Ethics
Passive pleasure is no pleasure at all.
ARTHUR ADAMOV
Ping Pong
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
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
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
We are so constituted that we can gain intense pleasure only from the contrast, and only very little from the condition itself.
SIGMUND FREUD
Civilization and Its Discontents
As to the lawful pleasures of the mind, the heart, or the senses, indulge in them with gratitude and moderation, drawing up sometimes in order to punish yourself, without waiting to be forced to do so by necessity.
HENRI-DOMINIQUE LACORDAIRE
Letters to Young Men
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