quotations about passion
Our passions are the keys of our frame, played upon by external objects.
RICHARD MALTRAVERS
The Life and Opinions of Sir Richard Maltravers
A ruling passion gives to a shelf of novels the unity of a system.
GRAHAM GREENE
Conversations with Graham Greene
A great tragedy passes from crest to hollow of passion, rises and sinks again, as rhythmically as sea-waves.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
Passion alone the abysses
Lights, while we grope up the rifted
Slopes; our spirits it kisses,
Ere into the deeps we are drifted.
HENRI CAZALIS
"Always"
A man or a woman without passions is like a windmill in a calm--motionless, ghastly, useless.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
Passion is the most essential part of any team. Not in the sense of some kind of pre-match team speech to get everyone riled up and ready to go. When pundits really analyse on the topic of passion, and really emphasise the importance it had on one game or another, it is not because of its presence but its lacking.
ADAM HILSENRATH
"The fundamentals of sporting passion", Cherwell Online, December 4, 2016
Passion and prejudice govern the world; only under the name of reason.
JOHN WESLEY
letter to Joseph Benson, October 5, 1770
There is not, in philosophy, a subject of more nice speculation than this of the different causes and effects of the calm and violent passions. It is evident passions influence not the will in proportion to their violence, or the disorder they occasion in the temper; but on the contrary, that when a passion has once become a settled principle of action, and is the predominant inclination of the soul, it commonly produces no longer any sensible agitation. As repeated custom and its own force have made every thing yield to it, it directs the actions and conduct without that opposition and emotion, which so naturally attend every momentary gust of passion. We must, therefore, distinguish betwixt a calm and a weak passion; betwixt a violent and a strong one. But notwithstanding this, it is certain, that when we would govern a man, and push him to any action, it will commonly be better policy to work upon the violent than the calm passions, and rather take him by his inclination, than what is vulgarly called his reason. We ought to place the object in such particular situations as are proper to encrease the violence of the passion. For we may observe, that all depends upon the situation of the object, and that a variation in this particular will be able to change the calm and the violent passions into each other. Both these kinds of passions pursue good, and avoid evil; and both of them are encreased or diminished by the encrease or diminution of the good or evil. But herein lies the difference betwixt them: The same good, when near, will cause a violent passion, which, when remote, produces only a calm one. As this subject belongs very properly to the present question concerning the will, we shall here examine it to the bottom, and shall consider some of those circumstances and situations of objects, which render a passion either calm or violent.
DAVID HUME
"Of the Causes of the Violent Passions", A Treatise of Human Nature
If you can't figure out your purpose, figure out your passion. For your passion will lead you directly to your purpose.
ANONYMOUS
He whose passions are inflamed looks at nothing beyond the present gratification.
FRANCIS WAYLAND
The Elements of Moral Science
Passion is for holidays, not homecoming.
JEANETTE WINTERSON
Written on the Body
Passion is a starter. It gives you enough motivation to get going. I would advise that you don't "go-out-to-sea" without it.... However, it is important to move from raw to refined passion (it means making raw passion practical and useful). Raw passion is short term. Refined passion has every element of the raw, plus the added advantage of long term, boredom-proof, consistent action. It's not tied to emotional fluctuation. This is the forte of professionals.
SAMUEL MPAMUGO
"Raw passion can harm go-getters", The Kenya Star, November 19, 2016
People love what other people are passionate about.
DAMIEN CHAZELLE
La La Land
If Passion drives, let Reason hold the reins.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1749
For an individual, success comes from wrapping your natural behavioral style and talents around a passion in your life. We like to call it your mint chocolate chip. When you are passionate about what you do and deliver it naturally, you are going to excel at it and get rewarded for it. You stop living vanilla ice cream. Because without passion in your life, your natural style is not focused. Without your natural style, your passion is not enjoyed.
STEVE VAN REMORTEL
"Adviser: Stop living vanilla ice cream", Green Bay Press Gazette, December 1, 2016
The philosopher who would fain extinguish his passions resembles the chemist who would like to let his furnace go out.
CHAMFORT
The Cynic's Breviary
A single spark of occasion discharges the child of passions into a thousand crackers of desire.
JOHANN CASPAR LAVATER
Aphorisms on Man
The great attraction and the great danger of passion is that it is something outside of oneself, a strong wind from nowhere in the face of which the forest of everyday thought and behavior cannot stand.
DAN SIMMONS
Lovedeath
Somewhere between fear and sex passion is. The way there is sudden. The way out is worse.
JEANETTE WINTERSON
The Passion
A Man in a Passion rides a mad Horse.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1749