Pretense Love Quotes & Sayings

The natural impulses of every thoroughbred include his sense of honor; his love of fair play and courage; his dislike of pretense and of cheapness. — Emily Post

It came to him then, permeated his disjointed thoughts. Billie was teaching him - him - how to make love. With a jolt of surprise at the crashing irony, Adrian realized he hadn't known how until now. He, the consummate lover, so renown for his sexual skill, so proficient and controlled and practiced, had only played at making love, where Billie ... God. Clearly, it was all she knew. Pretense just wasn't in her spectrum of capabilities. — Shelby Reed

Humility is by far the most spiritual virtue of the lot. The only way by which one may cease obsessing over himself is to wholly step outside his flesh. But who could do this by himself? And who would really want to under his natural pretense? And even if somehow he could and he succeeded, would not it be artificial? Would not he seem far too aware of his own talents of achieving humility for it to be such? Alternatively, he would need a distraction, something else to love; it is not that the Humbleman thinks poorly of himself, nor highly for that matter, but rather he does not think of himself at all - and this is because he is too busy loving something or someone else to do it. For the humility of this kind 'rears its head' as the most love-driven and free, spiritual of virtues; whereas its opposite, pride, the most self-imprisoning human vice. — Criss Jami

The whip degrades; a severe father teaches his children to dissemble; their love is pretense, and their obedience a species of self-defense. Fear is the father of lies. — Robert Green Ingersoll

When we drift from a deep, intimate companionship with God, we become negative, critical, judgmental and recalcitrant. We resist the repeated overtures of God's love. Neutrality and detached aloofness eventually result. We become respectably unresponsive. It happens to all of us at times. The telltale signs are equivocation, vacillation and pretense. — Lloyd John Ogilvie

To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us. — Timothy Keller

Every noble impulse, every unselfish expression of love; every brave suffering for the right; every surrender of self to something higher than self; every loyalty to an ideal; every unselfish devotion to principle; every helpfulness to humanity; every act of self-control; every fine courage of the soul, undefeated by pretense or policy, but by being, doing, and living of good for the very good's sake - that is spirituality. — David O. McKay

Or perhaps this hostility of yours is the pretense. Love does make liars out of your kind. — Cassandra Clare

How wide is all this long pretense!
There is in love a sweetness ready penned,
Copy out only that, and save expense. — George Herbert

How much self-love comes in the guise of selfless devotion! — Susan Sontag

He ran the back of his hand up her cheek, with the pretense of wiping away sweat. Do you think you could ever love me?
I don't think so.
Because I'm not good enough.
It's not like that.
Because I'm not smart.
No.
Because you couldn't love me.
Because I couldn't love you. — Jonathan Safran Foer

She touched his cheek. "I wondered what love felt like," she said. "Now I know." He crushed her to his chest again. There was no pretense with her. He kissed her again, not caring to hold back the depth of his love. His breathing was ragged when he raised his head. "Oh Addie, Addie, what did I do before you came into my life?" Tears shone on her lashes. "I don't think I lived before tonight." "We must be married. Quite soon, darling girl. I can't wait for long." "I'd marry you tonight," she said. "Right now." He traced the curve of her cheek with his finger. "I'll ask your father for your hand tonight." A shadow darkened the joy in her eyes. "What about Lord Carrington?" "What about him?" "Father seems quite set on a match with him." She wet her lips. "I've been thinking about what you said. That God might be disciplining him. You might be right. — Colleen Coble

You've been somebody long enough. You spent the first half of your life becoming somebody. Now you can work on becoming nobody, which is really somebody. For when you become nobody there is no tension, no pretense, no one trying to be anyone or anything. The natural state of the mind shines through unobstructed - and the natural state of the mind is pure love. — Ram Dass

There are two kinds of love: the love that is and the love that isn't. — Marty Rubin

Let's live a lie for today.
You'll spin tales
and pretend to love me.
And I'll smile; you'll not realize it's fake
Then I'll pretend
your pretensions don't cause me pain. — Sreesha Divakaran

Through an arrow loop in the wall she saw a familiar horse and rider tearing across the camp toward the healing rooms. Brigan pulled up at Nash's feet and dropped from the saddle. The two brothers threw their arms around each other and embraced hard.
Shortly thereafter he stepped into the healing rooms and leaned in the doorway, looking across at her quietly. Brocker's son with the gentle gray eyes.
She abandoned all pretense of decorum and ran at him. — Kristin Cashore

Basic anxiety can be roughly described as a feeling of being small, insignificant, helpless, deserted or endangered in a world that is out to abuse, cheat, humiliate, betray, envy ... And special in this is the child's feeling that the parents' love, their Christian charity, honesty, generosity ... may be only a pretense. — Karen Horney

... and suddenly I love you beyond all measure is not just words but a heart, a soul bursting open, a stripping raw of all pretense. It is Sully, it is Gabriel, it is his tears on my face, his body in mine, our minds seamless. It is hopes and dreams and failures. It is apologies and a prayer for redemption. It is heaven and damnation.
All that I am is yours pales beside it.
It is everything.
It is love. — Linnea Sinclair

When someone loves you for who you are (completely) without judgment, impossible conditions or pretense...your heart awakens, your soul comes alive, your senses are stimulated and you know true happiness. — Carlos Wallace

Why? Why is there a crisis in literature? Because of lies and rottenness. Simplicity and sincerity have been replaced by obsfucation and pretense. Men, of course. They love to create mystery where none exists. It's the way they think. — Alexander McCall Smith

Many times Christians state their love for the Lord and their willingness to die for Him. I will make no pretense of knowing the Lord's will in your life, but I do feel that in most cases the Lord is far more interested in our living for Him than He is in our dying for Him. — Zig Ziglar

I saw that for a long time I had not liked people and things, but only followed the rickety old pretense of liking. I saw that even my love for those closest to me had become only an attempt to love, that my casual relations -- with an editor, a tobacco seller, the child of a friend, were only what I remembered I should do, from other days. All in the same month I became bitter about such things as the sound of the radio, the advertisements in the magazines, the screech of tracks, the dead silence of the country -- contemptuous at human softness, immediately (if secretively) quarrelsome toward hardness -- hating the night when I couldn't sleep and hating the day because it went toward night. I slept on the heart side now because I knew that the sooner I could tire that out, even a little, the sooner would come that blessed hour of nightmare which, like a catharsis, would enable me to better meet the new day. — F Scott Fitzgerald

The pretense that the "abolition of slavery" was either a motive or justification for the war, is a fraud of the same character with that of "maintaining the national honor." Who, but such usurpers, robbers, and murderers as they, ever established slavery? Or what government, except one resting upon the sword, like the one we now have, was ever capable of maintaining slavery? And why did these men abolish slavery? Not from any love of liberty in general - not as an act of justice to the black man himself, but only "as a war measure," and because they wanted his assistance, and that of his friends, in carrying on the war they had undertaken for maintaining and intensifying that political, commercial, and industrial slavery, to which they have subjected the great body of the people, both black and white. — Lysander Spooner

We violated each other's boundaries with verbal missiles of anger disguised in the pretense of "just kidding. — David W. Earle

In the war room, love? What if someone comes in?"
I stood and removed his shirt. "Then they'll have a good story to tell."
"Good?" He adopted the pretense of being offended.
"Prove me wrong. — Maria V. Snyder

Eunice Goddard," he said, all pretense of sleepiness gone from his eyes, "will you marry me? I have no flowery speech prepared and would feel remarkably idiotic delivering it even if I had. Will you just simply marry me, my love? Because I love you? Will you take the risk? I am fully aware that there is a risk. I can only urge you to take a chance on me while I promise to do my very best to love and cherish you for the rest of my days and even perhaps beyond them. — Mary Balogh

How can one be pleasing to God when one is inflated with pride and self-love under the pretense of striving for Gods glory, while in fact one is seeking ones own glory? — Mary Faustina Kowalska

But here in my hometown, history was like a fine dust that settled out on everything. There was nothing to counter it. The culture had been hardened by a religion suspect of joy, yet fascinated by sin. Its moral acceptance of slavery eroded compassion. And gentility became a necessary pretense to cover the resentment created long ago when the North's industrial prestige trumped the agrarian South. It was not an easy place to feel lighthearted or triumphant. Nor was it an easy place to remember the beauty of wonder and awe. — Christina Carson

Russell observes that "the merits of democracy are negative: it does not ensure good government, but it prevents certain evils," such as the evil of a small group of individuals achieving a secure monopoly on political power. The chief peril for the politician, Russell insists, is love of power. And politicians can easily yield to the love of power on the pretense that they are pursuing some absolute good. — Bertrand Russell

For this was a kiss of definition. A kiss of understanding. For a marriage absent pretense. And a love without design. — Renee Ahdieh

The bully mind is not capable of loving or respecting others nor can it love or respect itself. Life's subtleties and the means of survival require its pretense of both these qualities. — Rick Stein

Until Della walked into my life I didn't understand the idea of love. I had never been in love and experienced very little love in my life. But I'd seen it once. My grandparents had loved each other until the day they died. I thought it was a myth. Then I met Della. She got under my skin and then she began to open emotions in me I didn't know existed. There is no pretense with her. She has no idea she's beautiful and she's completely selfless. But even if she weren't all those things her laugh and the look in her eyes when she's truly happy is the only thing that matters in life — Abbi Glines

No ... " said Professor Quirrell. "That is not why I am here. You have made no effort to hide your dislike for me, Miss Granger. I thank you for that lack of pretense, for I much prefer true hate to false love. — Eliezer Yudkowsky

I discovered that my obsession for having each thing in the right place, each subject at the right time, each word in the right style, was not the well-deserved reward of an ordered mind but just the opposite: a complete system of pretense invented by me to hide the disorder of my nature. I discovered that I am not disciplined out of virtue but as a reaction to my negligence, that I appear generous in order to conceal my meanness, that I pass myself off as prudent because I am evil-minded, that I am conciliatory in order not to succumb to my repressed rage, that I am punctual only to hide how little I care about other people's time. I learned, in short, that love is not a condition of the spirit but a sign of the zodiac. — Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Of course not! I knew you would protect me. You swore that you were strong enough to protect Vivienne, didn't you? How can you promise to protect my sister, but not trust yourself to keep me safe?"
The music swelled to a crescendo. Although Adrian kept her imprisoned against the muscular length of his body, he gave up all pretense of dancing. "Because I don't lose my wits every time Vivienne walks into a room. I don't toss and turn in my bed every night dreaming of making love to her. She doesn't drive me to distraction with her endless questions, her incessant snooping, her harebrained schemes." His voice rose. "I can trust myself to protect your sister because I'm not in love with her! — Teresa Medeiros

A bizarre sensation pervades a relationship of pretense. No truth seems true. A simple morning's greeting and response appear loaded with innuendo and fraught with implications. Each nicety becomes more sterile and each withdrawal more permanent. — Maya Angelou

Have you ever considered making at least a pretense of humility, Mr. Hunt? Just for the sake of politeness?
"I don't believe in false modesty."
"People might like you more if you did."
"Would you? — Lisa Kleypas

Love is a choice - not simply, or necessarily, a rational choice, but rather a willingness to be present to others without pretense or guide. Love is a conversion to humanity - a willingness to participate with others in the healing of a broken world and broken lives. Love is the choice to experience life as a member of the human family, a partner in the dance of life. — Carter Heyward

What to Accept
The fact of mountains. The actuality
Of any stone - by kicking, if necessary.
The need to ignore stupid people,
While restraining one's natural impulse
To murder them. The change from your dollar,
Be it no more than a penny,
For without a pretense of universal penury
There can be no honor between rich and poor.
Love, unconditionally, or until proven false.
The inevitability of cancer and/or
Heart disease. The dialogue as written,
Once you've taken the role. Failure,
Gracefully. Any hospitality
You're willing to return. The air
Each city offers you to breathe.
The latest hit. Assistance.
All accidents. The end. — Thomas M. Disch

What if, despite all our pretense and disguise, it was necessary to appear in public with the person we loved most of all? Imagine this a prerequisite for social discourse on Earth. — Carl Sagan

She drew herself up and took in a breath, concentrating on her inflection so that she could indulge him in his game. Then she leaned forward and, in her best, most sincerely love-struck voice, breathed, "I love thee."
Sonny's face was just inches from hers. His storm-gray eyes flashed, and the dark silk of his hair drifted across his cheek as he leaned in his head. "Perfect."
So was the kiss.
Perfect.
"I love thee," Sonny murmured, all pretense gone. — Lesley Livingston

Love of another is merely empty flattery and self-deception for one who cannot accept himself without pretense. — L.E. Modesitt Jr.

Pretension, dear love, does not buy truth into lies, nor alter its course. — Sreesha Divakaran

That's what real love amounts to - letting a person be what he really is. Most people love you for who you pretend to be. To keep their love, you keep pretending - performing. You get to love your pretence. It's true, we're locked in an image, an act - and the sad thing is, people get so used to their image, they grow attached to their masks. They love their chains. They forget all about who they really are. And if you try to remind them, they hate you for it, they feel like you're trying to steal their most precious possession. — Jim Morrison