Envy Quotes - Page 26

• If one steps out on a starry night and observes one's inner state, one asks if one could hate or be overwhelmed by envy or resentment. ... Is it not true that no man or woman has ever committed a crime while in a state of wonder?

  Jacob Needleman

  Hate, Night, Men

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• Envy and resentment are terribly corrosive passions. To suffer at the sight or even the thought of others' enjoyment of life makes one a committed enemy of human happiness. Such people end up being practically a curse upon the human race. They vandalize life, exerting themselves not in the pursuit of gain or pleasure, but to hinder others' enjoyment.

  Robert Sheaffer

  Passion, Race, Sight

  Robert Sheaffer (1991). “The Making of the Messiah: Christianity and Resentment”

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• Theorems often tell us complex truths about the simple things, but only rarely tell us simple truths about the complex ones. To believe otherwise is wishful thinking or "mathematics envy."

  Marvin Minsky

  Believe, Simple, Thinking

  "Music, Mind, and Meaning". Computer Music Journal, Volume 5, Number 3, web.media.mit.edu. 1981.

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• For envy, like lightning, generally strikes at the top Or any point which sticks out from the ordinary level. LUCRETIUS, De Rerum Natura Our envy always outlives the felicity of its object.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Lightning, Ordinary, Levels

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• As there is no worldly gain without some loss, so there is no worldly loss without some gain; if thou hast lost thy wealth, thou hast lost some trouble with it; if thou art degraded from thy honor, thou art likewise freed from the stroke of envy; if sickness hath blurred thy beauty, it hath delivered thee from pride. Set the allowance against the loss, and thou shalt find no loss great; he loses little or nothing, that reserves himself.

  Francis Quarles

  Art, Pride, Loss

  Francis Quarles (1844). “Enchiridion Institutions, Essays and Maxims, political, moral & divine. Divided into four centuries. By Francis Quarles”, p.42

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• See how the world (whose chaste and pregnant womb Of late conceiv'd, and brought forth nothing ill) Is now degenerated, and become A base adult'ress, whose false births do fill The earth with monsters, monsters that do roam And rage about, and make a trade to kill: Now glutt'ny paunches, and avarice a pawn; Pale envy pines, pride swells, and sloth begins to yawn.

  Francis Quarles

  Pride, Sloth, Monsters

  Francis Quarles, Joseph Swain, Edmund Evans (1861). “Quarles' Emblems”, p.12

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• Poets may boast (as safely-vain) Their work shall with the world remain: Both bound together, live, or die, The verses and the prophecy. But who can hope his lines shou'd long Last, in a daily changing tongue? While they are new, envy prevails, And as that dies, our language fails.

  Edmund Waller

  Long, Together, Lines

  1645 'Of English Verse'.

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• The only thing more certain than the hatred of enemies is the envy of friends.

  Evan Esar

  Hatred, Enemy, Certain

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• The idea that the object of constitutions is not to confirm the predominance of any interest, but to prevent it; to preserve with equal care the independence of labour and the security of property; to make the rich safe against envy, and the poor against oppression, marks the highest level attained by the statesmanship of Greece.

  Lord Acton

  Ideas, Independence, Levels

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.35, Jazzybee Verlag

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• We love much better those who endeavor to imitate us, than those who strive to equal us. For imitation is a sign of esteem, but competition of envy.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Competition, Imitation, Strive

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• Hatred is active displeasure, envy passive. We need not wonder that envy turns to soon to hatred.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Hatred, Needs, Wonder

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (2015). “Maxims and Reflections”, p.78, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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• What a day it is when we must envy the men in their graves.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Men, He Man, Graves

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (2013). “Delphi Works of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Illustrated)”, p.3574, Delphi Classics

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• O thou who art able to write a Book, which once in the two centuries or oftener there is a man gifted to do, envy not him whom they name City-builder, and inexpressibly pity him whom they name Conqueror or City-burner! Thou too art a Conqueror and Victor; but of the true sort, namely over the Devil: thou too hast built what will outlast all marble and metal, and be a wonder-bringing City of the Mind, a Temple and Seminary and Prophetic Mount, whereto all kindreds of the Earth will pilgrim.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Art, Book, Writing

  Thomas Carlyle, Rodger L. Tarr, Mark Engel (2000). “Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh in Three Books”, p.129, Univ of California Press

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• You know, I have had a terrible life. I married two men I really didn't like. My only daughter was killed in a car accident. My brother committed suicide. Has my life been a life for anyone to envy?

  Clare Boothe Luce

  Daughter, Suicide, Brother

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• Knowledge forbidden? Suspicious, reasonless. Why should their Lord Envy them that? Can it be sin to know, Can it be death? And do they only stand By ignorance? Is that their happy state, The proof of their obedience and their faith? O fair foundation laid whereon to build Their ruin!

  John Milton

  Ignorance, Knowledge, Foundation

  John Milton, Elijah Fenton (1795). “Paradise Lost: A Poem, in Twelve Books”, p.103

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• When the new light which we beg for shines in upon us, there be [those] who envy and oppose, if it come not first in at their casements.

  John Milton

  Light, Shining, Firsts

  John Milton (2003). “The Major Works”, p.269, Oxford University Press, USA

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• The maxim that men are not to be praised before their death was invented by envy and too lightly adopted by philosophers. I, on the contrary, maintain that they ought to be praised in their lifetime if they merit it; but jealousy and calumny, roused against their virtue or their talent, labour to degrade them if any one ventures to bear testimony to them. It is unjust criticism that they should fear to hazard, not sincere praise.

  Luc de Clapiers

  Men, Unjust Criticism, Hazards

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• This country of ours has more wealth than any nation, but that's not what makes us rich. We have the most powerful military on Earth, but that's not what makes us strong. Our universities and our culture are the envy of the world, but that's not what keeps the world coming to our shores. Instead, it is that American spirit - that American promise - that pushes us forward even when the path is uncertain; that binds us together in spite of our differences; that makes us fix our eye not on what is seen, but what is unseen, that better place around the bend.

  Barack Obama

  Country, Strong, Powerful

  Democratic National Convention Presidential Nomination Acceptance, delivered 28 August 2008, INVESCO Field at Mile High Stadium, Denver, Colorado

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• My conscience is my crown,Contented thoughts my rest;My heart is happy in itself,My bliss is in my breast.Enough I reckon wealth;A mean the surest lot,That lies too high for base contempt,Too low for envy's shot.

  Robert Southwell

  Lying, Heart, Mean

  Robert Southwell (1856). “The poetical works of the rev. Robert Southwell, now first completely ed. by W. B. Turnbull”, p.57

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• I am firmly convinced, as I have already said, that to effect any great social improvement, it is sympathy rather than self-interest, the sense of duty rather than the desire for self-advancement, that must be appealed to. Envy is akin to admiration, and it is the admiration that the rich and powerful excite which secures the perpetuation of aristocracies.

  Henry George

  Powerful, Self, Desire

  Henry George (1884). “Social Problems”

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• Never envy a man his lady. Behind it all lays a living hell.

  Charles Bukowski

  Men, Hell, Behinds

  "Charles Bukowski: Locked in the Arms of a Crazy Life". Book by Howard Sounes, 1998.

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• It is not envy or malice, as so many people think, but utter despair that has persuaded many educational reformers to recommend the abolition of the English public schools.

  Peter Medawar

  Educational, School, Thinking

  "The art of the soluble". Book by Peter Medawar, 1967.

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• I am not even an atheist so much as I am an antitheist; I not only maintain that all religions are versions of the same untruth, but I hold that the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief is positively harmful. Reviewing the false claims of religion, I do not wish, as some sentimental materialists affect to wish, that they were true. I do not envy believers their faith. I am relieved to think that the whole story is a sinister fairy tale; life would be miserable if what the faithful affirmed was actually the case.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Religious, Atheist, Thinking

  Christopher Hitchens (2009). “Letters to a Young Contrarian”, p.55, Basic Books

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• Elisabeth, again, while she praises her, is so far from hiding the Divine glory, that she ascribes everything to God. And yet, though she acknowledges the superiority of Mary to herself and to others, she does not envy her the higher distinction, but modestly declares that she had obtained more than she deserved.

  John Calvin

  Doe, Praise, Glory

  John Calvin (2013). “Commentary on Luke”, p.43, Ravenio Books

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• Certainly, envy is no monopoly of the poor; it makes itself felt in all sections of society; it haunts the court, the library, the barrack-room, even the sanctuary; it is provoked in some unhappy souls by the near neighbourhood of any superior rank or excellence whatever.

  Henry Parry Liddon

  Soul, Excellence, Unhappy

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