The evidence of the emotions, save in cases where it has strong objective support, is really no evidence at all, for every recognizable emotion has its opposite, and if one points one way then another points the other way. Thus the familiar argument that there is an instinctive desire for immortality, and that this desire proves it to be a fact, becomes puerile when it is recalled that there is also a powerful and widespread fear of annihilation, and that this fear, on the same principle proves that there is nothing beyond the grave. Such childish proofs are typically theological, and they remain theological even when they are adduced by men who like to flatter themselves by believing that they are scientific gents…
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
Sadness is almost never anything but a form of fatigue.
—Andre Gide (1869–1951) French Novelist
The first and simplest emotion which we discover in the human mind, is curiosity.
—Edmund Burke (1729–97) British Philosopher, Statesman
To give vent now and then to his feelings, whether of pleasure or discontent, is a great ease to a man’s heart.
—Francesco Guicciardini (1483–1540) Italian Historian, Political leader
Emotions have taught mankind to reason.
—Luc de Clapiers, marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–47) French Moralist, Essayist, Writer
All humanity is passion; without passion, religion, history, novels, art would be ineffectual.
—Honore de Balzac (1799–1850) French Novelist
The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
But are not this struggle and even the mistakes one may make better, and do they not develop us more, than if we kept systematically away from emotions?
—Vincent van Gogh (1853–90) Dutch Painter
You learn to put your emotional luggage where it will do some good, instead of using it to shit on other people, or blow up aeroplanes.
—Margaret Drabble (b.1939) English Novelist, Biographer, Critic, Short Story Writer
Sentimentality is the only sentiment that rubs you the wrong way.
—W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) British Novelist, Short-Story Writer, Playwright
The world makes up for all its follies and injustices by being damnably sentimental.
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95) English Biologist
Emotion always has its roots in the unconscious and manifests itself in the body.
—Irene Claremont de Castillejo (1885–1967) British Psychoanalyst
How do I change?
If I feel depressed I will sing.
If I feel sad I will laugh.
If I feel ill I will double my labour.
If I feel fear I will plunge ahead.
If I feel inferior I will wear new garments.
If I feel uncertain I will raise my voice.
If I feel poverty I will think of wealth to come.
If I feel incompetent I will think of past success.
If I feel insignificant I will remember my goals.
Today I will be the master of my emotions.
—Og Mandino (1923–96) American Self-Help Author
Our emotions are only incidents in the effort to keep day and night together.
—T. S. Eliot (1888–1965) American-born British Poet, Dramatist, Literary Critic
Every time a resolve or fine glow of feeling evaporates without bearing fruit, it is worse than a chance lost; it works to hinder future emotions from taking the normal path of discharge.
—William James (1842–1910) American Philosopher, Psychologist, Physician
It is as healthy to enjoy sentiment as to enjoy jam.
—G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English Journalist, Novelist, Essayist, Poet
He is not affected by the reality of distress touching his heart, but by the showy resemblance of it striking his imagination. He pities the plumage, but forgets the dying bird.
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809) American Nationalist, Author, Pamphleteer, Radical, Inventor
A sentimentalist is simply one who desires to have the LUXURY of an emotion without paying for it.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Systems die; instincts remain.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
One’s suffering disappears when one lets oneself go, when one yields – even to sadness.
—Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900–44) French Novelist, Aviator
Any emotion, if it is sincere, is involuntary.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
The walls we build around us to keep sadness out also keep out the joy.
—Jim Rohn (1930–2009) American Entrepreneur, Author, Motivational Speaker
The heart errs like the head; its errors are not any the less fatal, and we have more trouble getting free of them because of their sweetness.
—Anatole France (1844–1924) French Novelist
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American First Lady, Diplomat, Humanitarian
Nothing vivifies, and nothing kills, like the emotions.
—Philibert Joseph Roux (1780–1854) French Surgeon
Love is an ocean of emotions entirely surrounded by expenses.
—Thomas Dewar, 1st Baron Dewar (1864–1930) Scottish Businessperson
Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts, he does not hide; he exposes himself.
—Jeanne Moreau (1928–2017) French Stage, Screen Actor, Singer
As none can see the wind but in its effects on the trees, neither can we see the emotions but in their effects on the face and body.
—Nathaniel LeTonnerre
A clear understanding of a negative emotion dismisses it .
—Vernon Howard (1918–92) American Spiritual Teacher, Philosopher
The tragedy of life is in what dies inside a man while he lives-the death of genuine feeling, the death of inspired response, the death of the awareness that makes it possible to feel the pain or the glory of other men in yourself.
—Norman Cousins (1915–90) American Journalist, Author, Academic, Activist
Emotion is primarily about nothing and much of it remains about nothing to the end.
—George Santayana (1863–1952) Spanish-American Poet, Philosopher
It is very difficult to be wholly joyous or wholly sad on this earth. The comic, when it is human, soon takes upon itself a face of pain; and some of our grieves… have their source in weaknesses which must be recognized with smiling compassion as the common inheritance of us all.
—Joseph Conrad (1857–1924) Polish-born British Novelist
All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
An emotion is an automatic response, an automatic effect of man’s value premises. An effect, not a cause. There is no necessary clash, no dichotomy between man’s reason and his emotions
—Ayn Rand (1905–82) Russian-born American Novelist, Philosopher
If one uses one’s intellect to become master over the unlimited emotions, it may produce a sorry and diversionary effect upon the intellect.
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German Philosopher, Scholar, Writer
Music is the shorthand of emotion.
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian Novelist
In this and like communities public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed; consequently he who moulds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes and decisions. He makes statutes and decisions possible or impossible to be executed.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also.
—Robert Browning (1812–89) English Poet
There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Strange how love coexists with hate, how they render each other mute, how the swilling of them together makes a new and softer, sympathetic thing.
—Sonya Hartnett (b.1968) Australian Novelist, Children’s Writer
All emotions are pure which gather you and lift you up; that emotion is impure which seizes only one side of your being and so distorts you.
—Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) Austrian Poet
There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
The degree of one’s emotion varies inversely with one’s knowledge of the facts—the less you know the hotter you get.
—Bertrand A. Russell (1872–1970) British Philosopher, Mathematician, Social Critic
Society is infested by persons who, seeing that the sentiments please, counterfeit the expression of them. These we call sentimentalists—talkers who mistake the description for the thing, saying for having.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
The heart is half a prophet.
—Yiddish Proverb
Sentiment is intellectualized emotion; emotion precipitated, as it were, in pretty crystals by the fancy.
—James Russell Lowell (1819–91) American Poet, Critic
Swift instinct leaps; slow reason feebly climbs.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
Let’s not forget that the little emotions are the great captains of our lives and we obey them without realizing it.
—Vincent van Gogh (1853–90) Dutch Painter
Regret is an odd emotion because it comes only upon reflection. Regret lacks immediacy, and so its power seldom influences events when it could do some good.
—Edward William O’Rourke (1917–99) American Roman Catholic Bishop
There is no fire like passion, there is no shark like hatred, there is no snare like folly, there is no torrent like greed.
—The Dhammapada Buddhist Anthology of Verses