Instinct Quotes - Page 31

• The naive is what is or appears to be natural, individual, or classical to the point of irony or to the point of continuous alternation of self-creation and self-destruction. If it is only instinct, then it is childlike, childish, or silly; if it is only intention, it becomes affectation.

  Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

  Silly, Self, Irony

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• The naive which is simultaneously beautiful, poetic, and idealistic, must be both intention and instinct. The essence of intention, in this sense, is freedom. Consciousness is far from intention. There is a certain enamoured contemplation of one's own naturalness or silliness which itself is unspeakably silly. Intention does not necessarily require a profound calculation or plan.

  Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

  Beautiful, Silly, Essence

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• To be faithful to your instincts and the impulses that carry you in the direction of the excellence you most desire and value ... surely that is to lead the noble life.

  George Edward Woodberry

  Faithful, Excellence, Desire

  George Edward Woodberry (1933). “Selected letters of George Edward Woodberry”

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• In psychoanalysis as in art, God resided in the details, the discovery of which required enormous patience, unyielding seriousness, and the skill of an acrobat - walking a tightrope over memory and speculation, instinct and theory, feeling and denial.

  Judith Perelman Rossner

  Art, Memories, Discovery

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• Mastery in poetry consists largely in the instinct for not ruining or smothering or tinkering with moments of vision.

  Edmund Blunden

  Vision, Mastery, Tinkering

  Edmund Blunden (1930). “Leigh Hunt: a biography”, Archon Books

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• In spite of the pangs of travail, the longing for motherhood remains the most powerful instinct in woman.

  Joseph Hertz

  Powerful, Motherhood, Longing

  Joseph Herman Hertz (1941). “Ḥamishah ḥumshe Torah ʻim haftarot”

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• In our Mechanics' Fair, there must be not only bridges, ploughs, carpenter's planes, and baking troughs, but also some few finer instruments,--rain-gauges, thermometers, and telescopes; and in society, besides farmers, sailors, and weavers, there must be a few persons of purer fire kept specially as gauges and meters of character; persons of a fine, detecting instinct, who note the smallest accumulations of wit and feeling in the bystander.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Rain, Character, Bridges

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1851). “Essays, lectures and orations”, p.488

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• We find the instinct to shut out competition deep-rooted even among banks and corporations, among corner grocers and haberdasheries, among peanut vendors and shoeshine boys-and even among young ladies in search of a husband.

  James Farley

  Husband, Boys, Competition

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• I was not too stupid to learn, but too smart. Some instinct must have warned me that a woman accomplished in the domestic arts is frequently enslaved by them.

  Corra May Harris

  Art, Stupid, Accomplished

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• we are beginning to understand that this instinct of sex which has been so great a cause of suffering and shame and has been treated as a subject fit only for furtive whispers or silly jokes, is in fact one of the greatest powers in human nature, and that its misuse is indeed 'the expense of spirit in a waste of shame.

  Maude Royden

  Sex, Silly, Suffering

  Agnes Maude Royden (1924). “Sex and Common-sense”, p.3, Reprofis LLC

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• Intuition always has our best interest at heart.

  Christina Baldwin

  Heart, Intuition, Interest

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• If mothers are told to do this or that or the other,... they lose touch with their own ability to act.... Only too easily they feel incompetent. If they must look up everything in a book, they are always too late even when they do the right things, because the right things have to be done immediately. It is only possible to act at exactly the right point when the action is intuitive or by instinct, as we say. The mind can be brought to bear on the problem afterwards.

  Donald Woods Winnicott

  Mother, Book, Mind

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• We accept the need to train extensively to fly a plane; but think instinct should be enough for marrying and raising kids.

  Alain de Botton

  Kids, Thinking, Needs

  Twitter post from Apr 28, 2013

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• The psyche is the inward experience of the human body, which is essentially the same in all human beings, with the same organs, the same instincts, the same impulses, the same conflicts, the same fears. Out of this common ground have come what Jung has called the archetypes, which are the common ideas of myths.

  Joseph Campbell

  Ideas, Inward, Body

  Joseph Campbell, Bill Moyers (2011). “The Power of Myth”, p.60, Anchor

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• Man is born as a freak of nature, being within nature and yet transcending it. He has to find principles of action and decision-making which replace the principles of instincts.

  Erich Fromm

  Men, Decision, Principles

  Erich Fromm (2011). “The Revolution of Hope”, p.69, Lantern Books

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• As though God had turned away from the wise, and written his decrees, not in the mind of man but in the entrails of beasts, or left them to be proclaimed by the inspiration and instinct of fools, madmen, and birds. Such is the unreason to which terror can drive mankind!

  Baruch Spinoza

  Wise, Inspiration, Men

  "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus". Book by Baruch Spinoza, Preface, 1677.

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• The actress (Heidi Swedberg) is this wonderful girl, and ... I love her! i couldn't figure out how to play off of her. Her instincts for doing a scene - where the comedy was - and mine were always misfiring.

  Jason Alexander

  Love, Girl, Play

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• Good guilt is a product of love and responsibility. It is a natural, positive instinct that parents and good child care providers have. If bad guilt is a monster, good guilt is a friendly fairy godmother, yakking away in your head to keep you alert to the needs of your baby.

  Jean Marzollo

  Baby, Children, Responsibility

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• With women, there's a basic female instinct of caring deeply about the way they look; women stars have a narcissist complex.

  Edith Head

  Stars, Caring, Female

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• See, what a ready tongue suspicion hath!
  He that but fears the thing he would not know,
  Hath, by instinct, knowledge from others' eyes,
  That what he feared is chanced.

  William Shakespeare

  Eye, Tongue, Suspicion

  William Shakespeare, Giorgio Melchiori (2007). “The Second Part of King Henry IV”, p.87, Cambridge University Press

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• Because I come from such a close family, my natural instinct is to marry and have kids as soon as possible.

  Nicole Trunfio

  Kids, Natural Instinct, Close Family

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• People don't vote. Instinct tells them it's useless.

  Frank Herbert

  People, Useless, Vote

  Frank Herbert (1987). “Chapterhouse: Dune”, p.146, Penguin

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• Generally my instinct is to not do biographical movies. I want to build characters and not be locked into playing a part in history.

  Nicolas Cage

  Character, Want, Locked

  "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance - Nicolas Cage interview". Interview with Rob Carnevale, www.indielondon.co.uk.

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• [As an actor] I have ideas, but things should always be fluid. You should always be ready to follow an instinct. Something might reveal itself on the day.

  Michael Fassbender

  Ideas, Actors, Might

  "Michael Fassbender Talks Haywire, Twelve Years a Slave, Prometheus, and X-men: First Class Sequel". Interview with Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub, collider.com. January 17, 2012.

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• I've done a few movies where I really liked the project, but I wasn't sure about the director, and I still did it and my instinct was right, in the beginning. Even though it was a good story, the guy still didn't really know what he was doing.

  Ray Liotta

  Guy, Directors, Stories

  "Ray Liotta Talks THE SON OF NO ONE, THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES, and COGAN’S TRADE". Interview with Christina Radish, collider.com. November 2, 2011.

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