Quotes & Sayings About Cowardly Love

The Marquis De Sade said that the most important experiences a man can have are those that take him to the very limit; that is the only way we learn, because it requires all our courage. When a boss humiliates an employee, or a man humiliates his wife, he is merely being cowardly or taking his revenge on life, they are people who have never dared to look into the depths of their soul, never attempted to know the origin of that desire to unleash the wild beast, or to understand that sex, pain and love are all extreme experiences. Only those who know those frontiers know life; everything else is just passing the time, repeating the same tasks, growing old and dying without ever having discovered what we are doing here. — Paulo Coelho

Her voice was so melancholy that Gansey was struck all at once by what he and Blue really lost by keeping their relationship a secret. Blue radiated psychic energy for others, but touch was where she gained hers back. She was always hugging her mother or holding Noah's hand or linking her elbow in Adam's or resting her boots on Ronan's legs as they sat on the sofa. Touching Gansey's neck just between his hair and his collar. This worry in her tone demanded fingers braided together, arms on shoulders, cheeks rested against chests.
But because Gansey was too cowardly to tell Adam about falling in love with her, she had to stand there with her sadness by herself.
Aurora took Blue's hand. — Maggie Stiefvater

War was so many things, and not the least of which confusion. What was wrong? What was right, for that matter?
Was killing right or wrong? Brave or cowardly? Human nature or unnatural behavior of creatures too smart for their own good?
Loyalty, betrayal, hate, love, fear, friendship, teamwork, violence. War was connected to all of these. Hard work, sadness, suffering, discipline, chaos, questions, few answers, strategy, bravery, foolishness, death, life.
And both winning and losing were only two small aspects of the word war. — Kenzie Kovacs-Szabo

Whatever had made the Dean take such a fancy to him, a cowardly, selfish, obstinate, ugly old fellow like him? He would never understand it. He took the piece of paper out of his pocket and looked at that too. Faith in God. God. A word he had always refused. But the Dean had said, put the word love in its place. — Elizabeth Goudge

I learned regret in the ruins of Tarbfhlaith. I regretted that ambition had ruled my heart instead of affection for my kin. And with the lesson of regret came the gratitude for having life still to move my lips and limbs, and to speak kind words to and embrace those I may not see again on this sweet-smelling earth. I learned that I cannot wait to love what is in my presence, for it or I may well be gone tomorrow. To some, such as Giannon, this lesson poisons the heart with bitterness. But such bitterness has no value and is, in fact, cowardly. For bitterness risks nothing. — Kate Horsley

He found that love is never to be defined, that it grows and changes with every year of life, that each person knows it as a different miracle ... Nothing can shame it. Nothing can make it more splendid than it already is. Shared, wantoned or hidden forever, it can fill a life. There is no understanding love, and there is no defeat so precious as trying. No aspect of life is more complex, and none so simple. A look, a word, and the heart is torn forever; a touch, and it is mended. Love is brave and cowardly. In the same person it is secret and garrulous. But above all, love establishes its own rules and no man can know its complete manifestation in the heart of another. — James A. Michener

Look, this debate is basic: it's small government vs. big government. So how cowardly do folks like Blood and Frank Rich have to be that they can't man up and defend their love for collectivism? The only reason they scream race, is because that debate scares them. They know a racial accusation prevents dialogue, because such a harmful charge far outweighs any benefits of winning an argument. — Greg Gutfeld

Truth without love is imperious self-righteousn ess. Love without truth is cowardly self-indulgence . — Timothy Keller

Your cowardly self-delusions about "love" when you know as well as I do that there's never been anything between us but contempt and distrust and a terrible sickly dependence on each other's weakness- that's why. That's why I couldn't stop laughing about the Inability to Love, and that's why I can't stand to let you touch me, and that's why I'll never again believe in anything you think, let alone anything you say — Richard Yates

I admire a person who, for the love of art, is able to take off their clothes in front of a camera. But I'm not capable, I'm too cowardly for that. — Shakira

Let the brickwork of ignorance be thrown down, and let not spiritual sunshine be shut out from the self-deceived heart. Pride, Self-love, cowardly Mistrust of God's wisdom and goodness, are natural to our fallen nature; but the entrance of His Word into the heart is as that of the glorious beams of the day, - joy, brightness, and holiness follow the admission into its deepest recesses of the pure, life-giving light of Heaven! — A.L.O.E.

The problem is, we have too many cowardly, spineless, selfish people that would sacrifice their children's future just to avoid the sacrifice love requires of them in the present. And they expect their children to respect them for that? Do they think we're idiots just because we're young? — Darryl Steven Markowitz

He had also learned that the sick and unfortunate are far more receptive to traditional magic spells and exorcisms than to sensible advice; that people more readily accept affliction and outward penances than the task of changing themselves, or even examining themselves; that they believe more easily in magic than reason, in formulas than experience ... They would much rather pay in money and goods than in trust and love. They cheat one another and expect to be cheated themselves. You had to learn to see man as a weak, selfish, and cowardly creature; you also had to realize how many of these evil traits and impulses you shared yourself ... — Hermann Hesse

Owllwin was easiest the most contrary person Cricket had ever known. He was arrogant but humble, cowardly but brave, foolish but wise. He was funny, but sometimes she caught him crying when he was off on his own. It were as if he pushed himself to be a better person in spite of himself, in spite of his own failings, and Cricket secretly admired the fact: not many people were willing to admit they had faults in the first place. — Ash Gray

Real love, you cowardly miscreant, is never intimidated, never frightened and is forever. — Astrid Yrigollen

Hatred seems to work on the same glands as love: it even produces the same actions. If we had not been taught how to interpret the story of the Passion, would we have been able to say from their actions alone whether it was the jealous Judas or the cowardly Peter who loved Christ? — Graham Greene

More often than not, the demons of our nature love a recluse; nobody is more vulnerable to himself than the solitary. To imagine that one can simply withdraw, and somehow achieve peace, or wisdom, or detachment, is a mistake. It is also, in most cases, inappropriate, selfish, and even cowardly. — John Burnside

You think history is the history of loving hearts? You fool! Look at these millions of dead. Can you pity them, feel for them? You can nothing! There were too many. We burned them to ashes, we buried them with bulldozers. History is the history of cruelty, not love as soft men think. We have experimented with every human capacity to see which is strong and admirable and have shown that none is. There is only practicality. If the old God exists, he must be a murderer. But the one true god is Death. This is how it is - without cowardly illustrations. — Saul Bellow

He held up a book then. "I'm going to read it to you for relax."
"Does it have any sports in it?"
"Fencing. Fighting. Torture. Poison. True Love. Hate. Revenge. Giants. Hunters. Bad men. Good men. Beautifulest Ladies. Snakes. Spiders ... Pain. Death. Brave men. Cowardly men. Strongest men. Chases. Escapes. Lies. Truths. Passion. Miracles."
"Sounds okay," I said and I kind of closed my eyes. — William Goldman

It's a good thing to read a lot. It's a good thing to write a lot. The best thing to do is to live a lot. Fall in love. Fall out of love. Make a fool of yourself. Watch other people make fools of themselves. Believe something stupid and then realize you've been tricked. Feel embarrassed. Be brave and bold. Then be cowardly and pathetic. Give a damn about the world outside yourself. Have some very dark nights. It's all good. You'll use all of it. — Michael Grant

Small Man can be a very funny or a very tiresome Tour Companion, depending on how this kind of thing grabs you. He gambles, he drinks too much and he always runs away. Since the Rules allow him to make Jokes, he will excuse his behaviour in a variety of comical ways. Physically he is stunted and not at all handsome, although he usually dresses flamboyantly. He tends to wear hats with feathers in. You will discover he is very vain. But, if you can avoid smacking him, you will come to tolerate if not love him. He will contrive, in some cowardly way, to play a major part in saving the world. — Diana Wynne Jones

In times of struggle, there are as many reasons not to read as there are to breathe. Don't you have bigger things to do? Reading, let alone re-reading, is the terrain of milquetoasts and mopey spinsters. At life's ugliest junctures the very act of opening a book can smack of cowardly escapism. Who chooses to read when there's work to be done?

Call me a coward if you will, but when the line between duty and sanity blurs, you can usually find me curled up with a battered book, reading as if my mental health depended on it. And it does, for inside the books I love I find food, respite, escape, and perspective. — Erin Blakemore

There must be some other possibility than death or lifelong penance ... some meeting, some intersection of lines; and some cowardly, hopeful geometer in my brain tells me it is the angle at which two lines prop each other up, the leaning-together from the vertical which produces the false arch. For lack of a keystone, the false arch may be as much as one can expect in this life. Only the very lucky discover the keystone. — Wallace Stegner

And I said to myself that unless you conceive Death to be a violent guerrilla and kidnaper who snatches those you love, and if you are not cowardly and cannot submit to such terrorism as civilized people now do in every department of life, you must pursue and inquire and explore every possibility and seek everywhere and try everything. — Saul Bellow

He didn't love me," I murmur to the dirt. "I was just a means to an end."
Klo's grasp slips from my arm and I feel the blood rushing back to my fingers.Anger flashes on his face but it's quickly replaced by a sad, withering smile. "That's the most cowardly thing you've said yet. — Jessica Brody

I'm afraid of only two things: being lazy and being cowardly. I get up early in the morning and go to work. I love to write. — David Mamet

You may say suicide is a loss of control and cowardly. Foolish as it may sound, I am prepared to argue. — Dee Remy

In his savage, untutored breast new emotions were stirring. He could not fathom them. He wondered why he felt so great an interest in these people - why he had gone to such pains to save the three men. But he did not wonder why he had torn Sabor from the tender flesh of the strange girl.
Surely the men were stupid and ridiculous and cowardly. Even Manu, the monkey, was more intelligent than they. If these were creatures of his own kind he was doubtful if his past pride in blood was warranted.
But the girl, ah - that was a different matter. He did not reason here. He knew that she was created to be protected, and that he was created to protect her — Edgar Rice Burroughs

A love to Christ which is so cowardly and selfish that it is unwilling to proclaim by a public confession its faith in Him who hung before all the world crucified for sinners, is a love which is hardly worth the name. — Abbott Eliot Kittredge

All men are liars, fickle, chatterers, hypocrites, proud or cowardly, despicable, sensual ; all women faithless, tricky, vain, inquisitive, and depraved. The world is only a bottomless cesspool, where the most shapeless sea-beasts climb and writhe on mountains of slime. But there is in the world a thing holy and sublime - the union of two of these beings, imperfect and frightful as they are. One is often deceived in love, often wounded, often unhappy ; but one loves, and on the brink of the grave one turns to look back and says : I have suffered often, sometimes I have been mistaken, but I have loved. It is I who have lived, and not a spurious being bred of my pride and my sorrow — Alfred De Musset

No one is so cowardly that Love could not inspire him to heroism. — Plato

Well, all right. Something in what you say, I suppose. Consider you treacherous worm and contemptible, spineless cowardly custard, but have booked Spink-Bottle. Stay where you are, then, and I hope you get run over by an omnibus. Love. Travers — P.G. Wodehouse

Lena, listen to me, okay? We don't have much more time here. You are in love. I've never seen anything like this before. You have to be brave, okay? You have to go and tell Kostos how you feel. I swear to God if you don't, you will regret it for the rest of your cowardly life.'
'What if he doesn't like me back?'
'That's what I mean about being brave. — Ann Brashares

This avoidance of the difficult things of Scripture - of sinfulness and hell and God's notable severity - is idolatrous and cowardly. If a man or a woman who teaches the Scriptures is afraid to explain to you the severity of God, they have betrayed you, and they love their ego more than they love you. — Matt Chandler

It often occurs that pride and selfishness are muddled with strength and independence. They are neither equal nor similar; in fact, they are polar opposites. A coward may be so cowardly that he masks his weakness with some false personification of power. He is afraid to love and to be loved because love tends to strip bare all emotional barricades. Without love, strength and independence are prone to losing every bit of their worth; they become nothing more than a fearful, intimidated, empty tent lost somewhere in the desert of self. — Criss Jami

when it comes to love there is nothing so cowardly as a safe compromise. Life should be an adventure. There should be thrills. Risks. — Erica James

The emotion I'd held back for years assaulted me with staggering intensity. Everything. All of it. I cried for Clay, for the lost years with Courtney, but most of all for myself and the cowardly person I'd become. They were right. I was a shell of who I used to be and lived a lonely little life. I'd been certain that protecting my heart had been the right way to go. That Courtney and I didn't mix in the long term. That love was not for me. I'd been wrong on all counts. — Melissa Brayden

Ivoleyn is the most beautiful and remarkable woman in all of Altania, he said, his throat so tight the words inflicted a pain upon him, but he forged on all the same. I admire and love her to the fullest extent I am capable. I have ever since meeting her, though I was too stupid to understand at first what it was I felt. And once I did, I was too cowardly to make as stand for it. — Galen Beckett

Free, open love I have looked upon as dog's love. Secret love is, besides, cowardly. — Mahatma Gandhi

Love transforms our fragile, cowardly hearts into hearts of stone, hearts of blade, hearts of hardest iron. Because love makes heroes of us all. — Kelly Barnhill

I don't know one thing about the future. I don't know what the next hour will hold. There may be sickness, accident, personal or world catastrophe. Before this day is over I may have to deal with death, pain, loss, rejection. I don't know what the future holds for me, for those I love, for my nation, for this world. Still, despite my ignorance and surrounded by tinny optimists and cowardly pessimists, I say that God will accomplish his will, and I cheerfully persist in living in the hope that nothing will separate me from Christ's love. — Eugene H. Peterson

They who live without Love are dead. / But the worst of all deaths is this
/ That the loving soul be cowardly toward Love; / For perfect Love is never cowardly, / But claims its rights, which it lacks. — Hadewijch