quotations about pleasure
He who takes his fill of every pleasure ... becomes depraved; while he who avoids all pleasures alike ... becomes insensible.
ARISTOTLE
Nicomachean Ethics
The pleasure-pain mechanism in the body of man--and in the bodies of all the living organisms that possess the faculty of consciousness--serves as an automatic guardian of the organism's life. The physical sensation of pleasure is a signal indicating that the organism is pursuing the right course of action. The physical sensation of pain is a warning signal of danger, indicating that the organism is pursuing the wrong course of action, that something is impairing the proper function of its body.
AYN RAND
The Virtue of Selfishness
Many know how to please, but know not when they have ceased to give pleasure.
ARTHUR HELPS
Thoughts in the Cloister and the Crowd
Pleasure is a hedonistic reflex, a burning impulse to abandon rational thought altogether and immerse oneself in the moment.
GENE WALLENSTEIN
The Pleasure Instinct
The fact that all animals and men pursue pleasure is some indication that it is in some way the highest good.
ARISTOTLE
Nicomachean Ethics
Pleasure cannot be shared; like Pain, it can only be experienced or inflicted, and when we give Pleasure to our Lovers or bestow Charity upon the Needy, we do so, not to gratify the object of our Benevolence, but only ourselves. For the Truth is that we are kind for the same reason as we are cruel, in order that we may enhance the sense of our own Power.
ALDOUS HUXLEY
After Many a Summer Dies the Swan
The poor have very few hours in which to enjoy themselves; they must take their pleasure raw; they haven't the time to cook it.
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
Where There Is Nothing
Everywhere there is pleasure you will find a woman in disguise.
JEAN BAUDRILLARD
Cool Memories
The Puritans thought they could simply repress man's sexual nature, and they reaped a whirlwind as a result. Their code of sexual morality -- which became America's -- was nothing more than a set of rules laid down by people who believed that all pleasure was suspect.
HUGH HEFNER
Playboy, January 1974
Yet, sluggard, wake, and gull thy soul no more
With earth's false pleasures, and the world's delight,
Whose fruit is fair and pleasing to the sight,
But sour in taste, false as the putrid core:
Thy flaring glass is gems at her half light;
She makes thee seeming rich, but truly poor:
She boasts a kernel, and bestows a shell;
Performs an inch of her fair-promis'd ell:
Her words protest a heav'n; her works produce a hell.
FRANCIS QUARLES
Emblems
The highest pleasure is only consciousness of freedom from the deepest pain.
JAMES PARTON
Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin