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selfishness quotes

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“Selfishness must always be forgiven, you know, because there is no hope of a cure.” Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
“SELFISH, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others.” Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
“Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. And unselfishness is letting other people’s lives alone, not interfering with them.” Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism
“Courtesy is only a thin veneer on the general selfishness.” Honoré de Balzac, Letters of Two Brides
“I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“selflessness and bravery aren't all that different.” Veronica Roth, Divergent
“Nearly everyone in the world has appetites and impulses, trigger emotions, islands of selfishness, lusts just beneath the surface.” John Steinbeck, East of Eden
“Love is the most selfish of all the passions.” Alexandre Dumas, The Three Musketeers
“We make allowance for a certain degree of selfishness in men; because we know it to be inseparable from human nature, and inherent in our frame and constitution.” David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature
“To pity the unfortunate is not contrary to lust. On the contrary, we can quite well give such evidence of friendship, and acquire the reputation of kindly feeling, without giving anything. ” Blaise Pascal, Pensées
“I’m an egotist, but I’m not selfish. There’s a difference. I’m a neurotic, I guess. I can’t stop thinking about myself. It isn’t that I think myself so important... I simply can’t think about anything else, that’s all.” Henry Miller, Tropic of Cancer
“PRAY, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.” Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
“Go to the moon — you selfish dreamer!” Tennessee Williams, The Glass Menagerie
“Thus while the woman thinks of doing good offices and the man of respecting other people's rights, each sex, without any obvious unreason, can and does regard the other as radically selfish.” C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
“They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made...” F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
“Is it not sufficient for your infernal selfishness, that while you are at peace I shall writhe in the torments of hell?” Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“Every successful man is more or less a selfish man.” Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure
“You know, Emily was a selfish old woman in her way. She was very generous, but she always wanted a return. She never let people forget what she had done for them—and, that way she missed love.” Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles
“In selfish men caution is as secure an armour for their foes as for themselves.” Bram Stoker, Dracula

Related topics

love women self men passion success bravery peace hypocrisy living dream principles hell moon universe care forgiveness emotions human nature pity

Related authors

Ambrose Bierce (2)
Jane Austen (2)
Oscar Wilde (1)
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1)
Tennessee Williams (1)
John Steinbeck (1)
C. S. Lewis (1)
Blaise Pascal (1)
Alexandre Dumas (1)
Bram Stoker (1)
Thomas Hardy (1)
Henry Miller (1)
Agatha Christie (1)
David Hume (1)
Veronica Roth (1)
Honoré de Balzac (1)
Emily Brontë (1)

Related sources

The Devil's Dictionary (2)
The Glass Menagerie (1)
The Soul of Man under Socialism (1)
Pride and Prejudice (1)
East of Eden (1)
The Great Gatsby (1)
Wuthering Heights (1)
Tropic of Cancer (1)
Dracula (1)
The Screwtape Letters (1)
The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1)
A Treatise of Human Nature (1)
Letters of Two Brides (1)
The Three Musketeers (1)
Mansfield Park (1)
Jude the Obscure (1)
Pensées (1)
Divergent (1)