Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Desire
Passing into higher forms of desire, that which slumbered in the plant, and fitfully stirred in the beast, awakes in the man.
Henry George—Progress and Poverty. Bk. II. Ch. 3.
Nil cupientium
Nudus castra peti.
Naked I seek the camp of those who desire nothing.
Horace—Carmina. Bk. III. 16. 22.
The thing we long for, that we are
For one transcendent moment.
Lowell—Longing.
Nitimur in vetitum semper, cupimusque negata.
We are always striving for things forbidden, and coveting those denied us.
Ovid—Amorum. III. 4. 17.
Velle suum cuique est, nec voto vivitur uno.
Each man has his own desires; all do not possess the same inclinations.
Persius—Satires. V. 53.
As the hart panteth after the water-brooks.
Psalms. XLII. 1.
Oh! could I throw aside these earthly bands
That tie me down where wretched mortals sigh—
To join blest spirits in celestial lands!
Petrarch—To Laura in Death. Sonnet XLV.
I have
Immortal longings in me.
Antony and Cleopatra. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 282.
I do desire we may be better strangers.
As You Like It. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 274.
Can one desire too much of a good thing?
As You Like It. Act IV. Sc. 1. L. 123.
Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.
Midsummer Night’s Dream. Act IV. Sc. 1. L. 36.
Had doting Priam checked his son’s desire,
Troy had been bright with fame and not with fire.
Rape of Lucrece. L. 1,490.
There are two tragedies in life. One is not to get your heart’s desire. The other is to get it.
Bernard Shaw—Man and Superman. Act IV.
The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow,
The devotion to something afar
From the sphere of our sorrow.
Shelley—To——. One Word is too Often Profaned.
We grow like flowers, and bear desire,
The odor of the human flowers.
R. H. Stoddard—The Squire of Low Degree. The Princess Answers. I. L. 13.