The great man is he who does not lose his child’s-heart.
—Mencius (c.371–c.289 BCE) Chinese Philosopher, Sage
If there was ever a moment to follow your passion and do work that matters, this is it.
—Seth Godin (b.1960) American Entrepreneur
There is scarcely any passion without struggle.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Essayist, Novelist, Author
If you have no wish, how can it possibly come true?
—Seth Godin (b.1960) American Entrepreneur
It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.
—Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964) American Military Leader
Passions makes us feel, but never see clearly.
—Montesquieu (1689–1755) French Political Philosopher, Jurist
Passion and prejudice govern the world, only under the name of reason.
—John Wesley (1703–91) British Methodist Religious Leader, Preacher, Theologian
It was ideal apple-eating weather; the whitest sunlight descended from the purest sky, and an easterly wind rustled, without ripping loose, the last of the leaves on the Chinese elms. Autumns reward western Kansas for the evils at the remaining seasons impose: winter’s rough Colorado winds and hip-high, sheep slaughtering snows; the slushes and the strange land fogs of spring; and summer, when even crows seek the puny shade, and the tawny infinitude of wheatstalks bristle, blaze.
—Truman Capote (1924–84) American Novelist
Men live by intervals of reason under the sovereignty of caprice and passion.
—Thomas Browne (1605–82) English Author, Physician
A man can succeed at almost anything for which he has unlimited enthusiasm.
—Charles M. Schwab (1862–1939) American Businessperson
I have no respect for the passion of equality, which seems to me merely idealizing envy — I don’t disparage envy but I don’t accept it as legitimately my master.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
Anger has sweet tops born of poisoned roots. Blessed by the wise is he who, having killed that anger, never has to regret.
—Buddhist Teaching
Live with passion!
—Tony Robbins (b.1960) American Self-Help Author, Entrepreneur
If you’re not happy every morning when you get up, leave for work, or start to work at home—if you’re not enthusiastic about doing that, you’re not going to be successful.
—Donald M. Kendall (1921–2020) American Businessman
Men are not blindly betrayed into corruption, but abandon themselves to their passions with their eyes open; and lose the direction of truth, because they do not attend to her voice, not because they do not understand it.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
You are goodness and mercy and compassion and understanding. You are peace and joy and light. You are forgiveness and patience, strength and courage, a helper in time of need, a comforter in time of sorrow, a healer in time of injury, a teacher in times of confusion. You are the deepest wisdom and the highest truth; the greatest peace and the grandest love. You are these things. And in moments of your life you have known yourself to be these things. Choose now to know yourself as these things always.
—Neale Donald Walsch (b.1943) American Spiritual Writer
Bitter and poisonous as a serpent’s poison is sensual desire with which fools are infatuated. Crowded in hell, they have to spend their long, tortured lives there.
—Buddhist Teaching
A man is by nothing so much himself, as by his temper and the character of his passions and affections. If he loses what is manly and worthy in these, he is as much lost to himself, as when he loses his memory and understanding.
—Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury (1621–83) British Statesman
What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight; it’s the size of the fight in the dog.
—Unknown
All the passions, says an old writer, “are such near neighbors, that if one of them is on fire the others should send for the buckets.” Thus love and hate being both passions, the one is never safe from the spark that sets the other ablaze.
—Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton (1803–73) British Novelist, Poet, Politician
Let us go singing as far as we go; the road will be less tedious.
—Virgil (70–19 BCE) Roman Poet
This, indeed, is one of the eternal paradoxes of both life and literature—that without passion little gets done; yet, without control of that passion, its effects are largely ill or null.
—F. L. Lucas (1894–1967) English Literary Critic, Poet, Novelist, Playwright
However vast a man’s spiritual resources, he is capable of but one great passion.
—Blaise Pascal (1623–62) French Mathematician, Physicist, Theologian
It is a revenge the devil sometimes takes upon the virtuous, that he entraps them by the force of the very passion they have suppressed and think themselves superior to.
—George Santayana (1863–1952) Spanish-American Poet, Philosopher
All passions are good or bad, according to their objects: where the object is absolutely good, there the greatest passion is too little; where absolutely evil, there the least passion is too much; where indifferent, there a little is enough.
—Francis Quarles (1592–1644) English Religious Poet
I think that, as life is action and passion, it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not to have lived.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Author
Be still when you have nothing to say; when genuine passion moves you, say what you’ve got to say, and say it hot.
—D. H. Lawrence (1885–1930) English Novelist, Playwright, Poet, Essayist, Literary Critic
But when you think you’re supposed to do something with it and imagine that you’re the doer, that’s pure delusion. Just follow your passion. Do what you love. Inquire, and have a happy life while you’re doing it.
—Byron Katie (b.1942) American Speaker, Author
The man who does not work for the love of work but only for money is not likely to make money nor to find much fun in life.
—Charles M. Schwab (1862–1939) American Businessperson
O my God, what must a soul be like when it is in this state! It longs to be all one tongue with which to praise the Lord. It utters a thousand pious follies, in a continuous endeavor to please Him who thus possesses it.
—Teresa of Avila (1515–82) Spanish Carmelite Nun, Mystic