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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” - 1814

“Courtesy is only a thin veneer on the general selfishness.” Honoré de Balzac, “Letters of Two Brides” - 1841

“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” - 1891

“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” - 1911

“SELFISH, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others.” Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil's Dictionary” - 1906

“Every successful man is more or less a selfish man.” Thomas Hardy, “Jude the Obscure” - 1895

“Love is the most selfish of all the passions.” Alexandre Dumas, “The Three Musketeers” - 1844

“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” - 1847

“I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle.” Jane Austen, “Pride and Prejudice” - 28 January 1813

“Go to the moon — you selfish dreamer!” Tennessee Williams, “The Glass Menagerie” - 1944

“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” - 1925

“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” - 1920

“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” - 1738

“In selfish men caution is as secure an armour for their foes as for themselves.” Bram Stoker, “Dracula” - 1897

“Nearly everyone in the world has appetites and impulses, trigger emotions, islands of selfishness, lusts just beneath the surface.” John Steinbeck, “East of Eden” - 1952

“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” - 1934

“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” - 1942

“selflessness and bravery aren't all that different.” Veronica Roth, “Divergent” - 2011

Related topics

love passion men women human nature success emotions dream care foes courtesy generosity bravery hell forgiveness caution peace practice principles moon

Related authors

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

Related sources

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