Quotes & Sayings About Temporary Pleasure

If we could survive without a wife, citizens of Rome, all of us would do without that nuisance; but since nature has so decreed that we cannot manage comfortably with them, nor live in any way without them, we must plan for our lasting preservation rather than for our temporary pleasure. — Augustus

Fools are unable to comprehend the wisdom of asking God to manifest His desires into their own hearts. Instead, they ignore the tugs of the Holy Spirit on their heartstrings. They follow after their own yearnings, which only provide temporary pleasure, incomplete joy, and eventual damnation. — Cheryl Zelenka

My son, you've seen the temporary fire
and the eternal fire; you have reached
the place past which my powers cannot see.
I've brought you here through intellect and art;
from now on, let your pleasure be your guide;
you're past the steep and past the narrow paths.
Look at the sun that shines upon your brow;
look at the grasses, flowers, and the shrubs
born here, spontaneously, of the earth.
Among them, you can rest or walk until
the coming of the glad and lovely eyes
those eyes that weeping, sent me to your side.
Await no further word or sign from me:
your will is free, erect, and whole
to act
against that will would be to err: therefore
I crown and miter you over yourself — Dante Alighieri

There are two kinds of happiness - the temporary pleasure derived primarily from material comfort alone and another more enduring comfort that results from the thorough transformation and development of the mind. We can see in our own lives that the latter form of happiness is superior because when our mental state is calm and happy, we can easily put up with minor pains and physical discomforts. On the other hand, when our mind is restless and upset, the most comfortable physical facilities do not make us happy. — Dalai Lama

If I catch you, I might do anything. I might strip the skin from your bones as I drain you dry. Or I might drag you into my chambers and have you pleasure me in ways you cannot even imagine. I might even take mercy on you, and that would be the cruelest injustice of all, because for you, it would only be a temporary reprieve. — Nenia Campbell

Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure - but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico, or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence, because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. — Edmund Burke

Don't trade future blessings for temporary pleasures. — Don Davis

The average married man, if he had the energy, could have sex with several women without diminishing the affection and desire he felt for his wife. But women like Judith- unlike truly liberated females like Barbara and Arlene- could not simply accept a man as a temporary instrument of pleasure; they wanted soft lights and promises, not just a penis but the man attached to it. — Gay Talese

Pleasure is not diversion but urgent life, a social order perceived as temporary. — Don DeLillo

Suffering for Jesus is temporary. Pleasure in Jesus is eternal. — John Piper

When indeed Religion is kindled into enthusiasm, its force like that of other passions is increased by the sympathy of a multitude. But enthusiasm is only a temporary state of Religion, and whilst it lasts will hardly be seen with pleasure at the helm. Even in its coolest state, it has been much oftener a motive to oppression than a restraint from it. — James Madison

Stuff only allows you to rent temporary pleasure. — Linda Deir

Human existence is temporary and all the knowledge of the universe we acquire will in time be forgotten because there will be no humans left to benefit from any of the stuff we learned.
And yet, this doesn't invalidate scientific exploration to me. We seek to understand the universe because it makes our lives better and more rich. Similarly, we tell stories (and think about why and how to tell stories) because it makes human existence richer. Made-up stories matter. They bring us pleasure and solace and nurture empathy by letting us see the world through others' eyes. They also help us to feel unalone, to understand that our grief and joy is shared not just by those around us but by all those who came before us and all those still yet to come. — John Green

Princes are fighters or administrators. Neither of those things do much to spread joy in the world. Whores, concubines, and catamites, on the other hand, are all about giving satisfaction. Now granted, sexual pleasure is a temporary sort of happiness, but it is better than a new tax or a sword in the gut. — Jill Knowles

Temporary pleasure leads to permanent pain but temporary pain leads to permanent pleasure", — Soorej Gopi

The course of this world is pervasive, keeping the captives quiet with the morphine of temporary pleasure at the expense of their eternal souls. — Gloria Furman

My God, a moment of bliss. Why, isn't that enough for a whole lifetime? — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Sex is life: The act of creation in pleasure, the loss of oneself in another, the coming together of opposites in a temporary union of yin and yang, that creates something other than either. What is life if not this? — Frederick Lenz

Envy, though not the greatest sin, is the only one that gives the sinner no pleasure at all, not even fake and temporary satisfaction. — Peter Kreeft

Though you and I find ourselves surrounded by the lure of temporary pleasure, we must fasten our affections on the one who promises eternal treasure that will never spoil or fade. If your life or my life is going to count on earth, we must start by concentrating on heaven. For then, and only then, will you and I be free to take radical risk, knowing that what awaits us is radical reward. — David Platt

But he felt the relief of being alone as well ... the forgotten solitude which measures and verifies the strength of an affair, and which, being temporary, is a kind of pleasure. — Alan Hollinghurst

Both good and evil, when they are full grown, become retrospective ... That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporary suffering, 'No future bliss can make up for it,' not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say 'Let me but have this and I'll take the consequences': little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. — C.S. Lewis

For the perversely minded, simply killing the trinkets of your greatest amusement and nutritional satisfaction produces at best only temporary elation, a dazzling sensation that is over in a flash, but to permit your prey to fear calamity and to live through catastrophes large and small, to hope and to weep and to lament, to feel anguish over things lost, to regret things found, and to suffer with physical discomfort, emotional injuries and psychological lesions is the wellhead of enduring pleasure. — John Zande