Passion

Passion (from the Latin verb patior, meaning to suffer or to endure, also related to compatible) is an emotion applied to a very strong feeling about a person or thing. Passion is an intense emotion compelling feeling, enthusiasm, or desire for something.

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• Passion persuades me one way, reason another. I see the better and approve it, but I follow the worse.
  • Ovid, Metamorphoses, 7. 19-21.

• Our headstrong passions shut the door of our souls against God.
  • Confucius, reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 442.

• Passion very often makes the wisest men fools, and very often too inspires the greatest fools with wit.
  • François de La Rochefoucauld, Moral Maxims and Reflections, no. 7 (1665-1678)

• The ruling passion, be it what it will,
  The ruling passion conquers reason still.
  • Alexander Pope, Moral Essays. Epistle iii. Line 153. (1732)

• We may affirm absolutely that nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion.
  • Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of History (1832)

• The passion rebuilds the world for the youth. It makes all things alive and significant.
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Love," Essays, First Series (1841)

• For passion, be it observed, brings insight with it; it can give a sort of intelligence to simpletons, fools, and idiots, especially during youth.
  • Honoré de Balzac, ''Les Célibataires (A Bachelor's Establishment), first part was published as Les Deux Frères in La Presse (1841)

• Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring.
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Considerations by the Way," The Conduct of Life (1860)

• Without passion man is a mere latent force and possibility, like the flint which awaits the shock of the iron before it can give forth its spark.
  • Henri-Frédéric Amiel, Journal Intime, entry for December 17, 1856 (1882)

• A toothache, or a violent passion, is not necessarily diminished by our knowledge of its causes, its character, its importance or insignificance.
  • T. S. Eliot, Doctoral dissertation in philosophy; submitted to Harvard in 1916. Knowledge and Experience in the Philosophy of F.H. Bradley, ch. 1, Columbia University Press (1964)

• We should employ our passions in the service of life, not spend life in the service of our passions.
  • Richard Steele, reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 442.

• It is obvious that we can no more explain a passion to a person who has never experienced it than we can explain light to the blind.
  • T. S. Eliot, Doctoral dissertation in philosophy; submitted to Harvard in 1916. Knowledge and Experience in the Philosophy of F.H. Bradley, ch. 1, Columbia University Press (1964)

• Most marriages recognize this paradox: Passion destroys passion; we want what puts an end to wanting what we want.
  • The Aristos (1964)

• If you have a great passion it seems that the logical thing is to see the fruit of it, and the fruit are children.
  • Roman Polanski, Independent on Sunday (London, May 12, 1991)

• What is passion? It is surely the becoming of a person. Are we not, for most of our lives, marking time? Most of our being is at rest, unlived. In passion, the body and the spirit seek expression outside of self. Passion is all that is other from self. Sex is only interesting when it releases passion. The more extreme and the more expressed that passion is, the more unbearable does life seem without it. It reminds us that if passion dies or is denied, we are partly dead and that soon, come what may, we will be wholly so.
  • John Boorman, Projections, entry for May 16, 1991, eds. John Boorman and Walter Donohue (1992)

• Connect with all the passions people have - for themselves, their families and their wider world - and they'll follow you to the ends of the earth. They will spread goodwill about your business, work hard for you, and buy your products, services and stock with pride. You will attract the best people, form highly motivated teams, collect loyal customers, sell the strongest brands with the greatest purpose and highest values, promising a better future.
  • Patrick Dixon - Building a Better Business, p. 1 (2005)

• Discover your divine assignment and you have no reason to retreat. Discover your passion and you laugh in the face of defeat.
  • Kirk Nugent, Pursue Your Passion, Public Speech http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4wDVrfLIq0, 5:10/6:17 (2007)

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• God loves with a great love the man whose heart is bursting with a passion for the impossible.
  • William Booth