Inclination Quotes

• The inclination to self-depreciation, to freely accepting being robbed, being duped, and being swindled, could be the modesty of a god among men.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Men, Self, Modesty

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• Whenever there is authority, there is a natural inclination to disobedience.

  Thomas Chandler Haliburton

  Power, Natural, Authority

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• I put for the general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death.

  Thomas Hobbes

  Authority And Power, Desire, Leviathan

  Leviathan pt. 1, ch. 11 (1651)

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• Friendship is a strong and habitual inclination in two persons to promote the good and happiness of one another.

  Eustace Budgell

  Friendship, Relationship, Strong

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• Young people are threatened... by the evil use of advertising techniques that stimulate the natural inclination to avoid hard work by promising the immediate satisfaction of every desire.

  Pope John Paul II

  Hard Work, People, Evil

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• Vice came in always at the door of necessity, not at the door of inclination.

  Daniel Defoe

  Doors, Vices

  'Moll Flanders' (1721)

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• Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is more or less strong tendency ordered to an intrinsic moral evil, and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.

  Pope Benedict XVI

  Strong, Evil, Moral

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• A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good.

  Samuel Johnson

  Education, Reading, Men

  Quoted in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (entry for 14 July 1763)

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• When natural inclination develops into a passionate desire, one advances towards his goal in seven-league boots.

  Nikola Tesla

  Passion, League, Goal

  Nikola Tesla (2014). “My Inventions Nikola Tesla's Autobiography”, p.26, Lulu.com

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• One must work, if not from inclination, at least out of despair — since it proves, on close examination, that work is less boring than amusing oneself.

  Charles Baudelaire

  Boredom, Boring, Amusing

  "My Heart Laid Bare, and Other Prose Writings".

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• Whatever a person frequently thinks and reflects on, that will become the inclination of their mind.

  Gautama Buddha

  Thinking, Mind, Cognitive Therapy

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• The inclination to aggression constitutes the greatest impediment to civilization.

  Sigmund Freud

  Civilization, Aggression, Impediments

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• If the system is broken, my inclination is to fix it rather than to fight it. I have faith in the process of the law, and if it is carried out fairly, I can live with the results, whatever they may be.

  Sonia Sotomayor

  Fighting, Law, Broken

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• My natural inclination to be improv rather than an educated character serves me well.

  Gary Vaynerchuk

  Character, Natural, Educated

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• When a woman has scholarly inclinations there is usually something wrong with her sexuality.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Sexuality, Sexist, Scholarly

  Friedrich Nietzsche, Rolf-Peter Horstmann, Judith Norman (2002). “Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future”, p.69, Cambridge University Press

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• In this world the inclination to do things is of more importance than the mere power.

  Edwin Hubbel Chapin

  World, Importance, Mere

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• It is a secret known but to few, yet of no small use in the conduct of life, that when you fall into a man's conversation, the first thing you should consider is, whether he has a greater inclination to hear you, or that you should hear him.

  Richard Steele

  Fall, Men, Secret

  Joseph Addison, Sir Richard Steele (1826). “The Spectator: With Notes, and a General Index”, p.64

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• Writing is something I took up rather than anything I had an inclination toward. I like acting -delivering someone else's message - but writing is more of an accomplishment.

  Steve Martin

  Writing, Accomplishment, Acting

  "COVER STORY : A Side Order of Steve Martin : He's had his ups and downs with L.A., but they're back together in his new movie". Interview with Elaine Dutka, articles.latimes.com. February 3, 1991.

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• ...we shall incur no slight injury, but rather great danger, if we rashly yield ourselves to the inclinations of men who aim at exciting strife and tumults, so as to draw us away from what is good? Let us cleave, therefore, to those who cultivate peace with godliness?

  John of Damascus

  Christian, Men, Yield

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• To be beneficent when we can is a duty; and besides this, there are many minds so sympathetically constituted that, without any other motive of vanity or self-interest, they find a pleasure in spreading joy around them, and can take delight in the satisfaction of others so far as it is their own work. But I maintain that in such a case an action of this kind, however proper, however amiable it may be, has nevertheless no true moral worth, but is on a level with other inclinations. . . . For the maxim lacks the moral import, namely, that such actions be done from duty, not from inclination.

  Immanuel Kant

  Work, Vanity, Self

  Immanuel Kant (2012). “Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals”, p.14, Courier Corporation

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• ...night possessed us and the shadow of death encompassed us, for we had fallen into sin and lost the power of sight which was ours by God's grace and by which we were able to perceive the light that bestows true life. Night and death had been poured out on our human nature, not because of any change in the true light, but because we had turned aside and no longer had any inclination towards the life-bearing light. In the last times, however, the Giver of eternal light and Source of true life has had mercy upon us.

  Gregory Palamas

  Christian, Night, Shadow Of Death

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• Firmly believe that the Lord is at all times everything to you. During prayer He is the power and the fulfillment in the Holy Spirit of each of your words. During pious conversation He is your living water, the ardent flow of your words at all times ? He is everything to you. Be free from care in the presence of your Lord. He has enclosed you with Himself upon all sides. He penetrates you wholly and knows all your thoughts, all your needs and inclinations, and if you live in Him with faith and love, then no evil shall befall you. 'The Lord is at hand; be careful for nothing' (Phil. 4:6).

  John of Kronstadt

  Christian, Prayer, Believe

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• The other producer of old age is habit: the deathly process of doing the same thing in the same way at the same hour day after day, first from carelessness, then from inclination, at last from cowardice or inertia. Luckily the inconsequent life is not the only alternative; for caprice is as ruinous as routine. Habit is necessary; it is the habit of having habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive.

  Edith Wharton

  Writing, Age, Routine

  "A Backward Glance".

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• The National Socialist Party in Austria never tried to hide its inclination for a greater Germany.

  Arthur Seyss-Inquart

  Party, Germany, Austria

  Speech in Berlin on April 07, 1938. "Trial of the Germans". Book by Eugene Davidson, 1966.

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• We launch when we're kind of in the same orbit that they are in terms of being matched up in inclination in space, and we're just in a little different altitude.

  Linda M. Godwin

  Space, Orbit, Different

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