And Nothing is very strong: strong enough to steal away a man's best years not in sweet sins but in a dreary flickering of the mind over it knows not what and knows not why, in the gratification of curiosities so feeble that the man is only half aware of them, in drumming of fingers and kicking of heels, in whistling tunes that he does not like, or in the long, dim labyrinth of reveries that have not even lust or ambition to give them a relish, but which, once chance association has started them, the creature is too weak and fuddled to shake off.
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My children cause me the most exquisite suffering of which I have any experience. It is the suffering of ambivalence: the murderous alternation between bitter resentment and raw-edged nerves, and blissful gratification and tenderness. Sometimes I seem to myself, in my feelings toward these tiny guiltless beings, a monster of selfishness and intolerance.
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We find amongst animals, as amongst men, power of feeling pleasure, power of feeling pain; we see them moved by love and by hate; we see them feeling terror and attraction; we recognize in them powers of sensation closely akin to our own, and while we transcend them immensely in intellect, yet in mere passional characteristics our natures and the animals’ are closely allied. We know that when they feel terror, that terror means suffering. We know that when a wound is inflicted, that wound means pain to them. We know that threats bring to them suffering; they have a feeling of shrinking, of fear, of absence of friendly relations, and at once we begin to see that in our relations to the animal kingdom a duty arises which all thoughtful and compassionate minds should recognize—the duty that because we are stronger in mind than the animals, we are or ought to be their guardians and helpers, not their tyrants and oppressors, and we have no right to cause them suffering and terror merely for the gratification of the palate, merely for an added luxury to our own lives.
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The opening of a foreign trade, by making them acquainted with new objects, or tempting them by the easier acquisition of things which they had not previously thought attainable, sometimes works a sort of industrial revolution in a country whose resources were previously undeveloped for want of energy and ambition in the people: inducing those who were satisfied with scanty comforts and little work, to work harder for the gratification of their new tastes, and even to save, and accumulate capital, for the still more complete satisfaction of those tastes at a future time.
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'There's no greater temptation than to use a protest to vent the frustration and anger that we all feel in the face of atrocity. Sometimes it feels really good to blow off steam at animal abusers and people who defend them. But the purpose of a demonstration is not to make us feel good. If we present the public with an image of animal activists as angry/hostile/crude, we have sacrificed the good of the animals for our own gratification.'
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1 John 2:16:
For everything in the world – the cravings of sinful people, the lust of their eyes and their boasting about what they have and do – comes not from the Father but from the world.
(NIV)
For all that is in the world--the lust of the flesh [craving for sensual gratification] and the lust of the eyes [greedy longings of the mind] and the pride of life [assurance in one's own resources or in the stability of earthly things]--these do not come from the Father but are from the world [itself].
(AMP)
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
(KJV)
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By interpreting freedom as the propagation and immediate gratification of needs, people distort their own nature, for they engender in themselves a multitude of pointless and foolish desires, habits, and incongruous stratagems. Their lives are motivated only by mutual envy, sensuality, and ostentation.
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There is nothing capricious in nature and the implanting of a desire indicates that its gratification is in the constitution of the creature that feel it.
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It is better in some respects to be admired by those with whom you live, than to be loved by them. And this is not on account of any gratification of vanity, but because admiration is so much more tolerant than love.
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Instead of solid accomplishments, the man pursues pleasures and self-gratification. He will never achieve anything so long as he is surrounded by dissipating temptations.
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Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.
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1 Timothy 5:6:
But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives.
(NIV)
Whereas she who lives in pleasure and self-gratification [giving herself up to luxury and self-indulgence] is dead even while she [still] lives.
(AMP)
But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
(KJV)
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Other creatures kill mainly for survival whereas we kill mainly for self-gratification.
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Many persons have the wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.
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Many people have the wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.
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... religion (ought to be if it isn't) a great deal more than mere gratification of the instinct for worship linked with the straight-teaching...
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I believe the sign of maturity is accepting deferred gratification.
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Nothing is more pleasing and engaging than the sense of having conferred benefits. Not even the gratification of receiving them.
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Men may claim to be wise because they know how many stars are in the sky. But the truth is these men are either fools or cowards. because only a fool or a coward would expect gratification for a theory that cannot be proven wrong.
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Instant gratification takes too long.
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The gratification of wealth is not found in mere possession or in lavish expenditure, but in its wise application.
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Instant gratification is not soon enough.
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James 4:2:
You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God.
(NIV)
You are jealous and covet [what others have] and your desires go unfulfilled; [so] you become murderers. [To hate is to murder as far as your hearts are concerned.] You burn with envy and anger and are not able to obtain [the gratification, the contentment, and the happiness that you seek], so you fight and war. You do not have, because you do not ask. [I John 3:15.](AMP)
Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.
(KJV)
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DATO'S LAW. Wishes expand in direct proportion to the resources available for their gratification.
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There is a sort of gratification in doing good which makes us rejoice in ourselves.
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Unbridled gratification produces unbridled desire.
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It is the nature of desire not to be satisfied, and most men live only for the gratification of it.
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