This assumption that she need look for no more devotion now that her beauty had passed proceeded from the fact that she had never realized any love save love as passion. Such love, though it expends itself in generosity and thoughtfulness, though it give birth to visions and to great poetry, remains among the sharpest expressions of self-interest. Not until it has passed through a long servitude, through its own self-hatred, through mockery, through great doubts, can it take its place among the loyalties. Many who have spent a lifetime in it can tell us less of love than the child that lost a dog yesterday. . Thornton Wilder
About This Quote

In Romeo and Juliet , Shakespeare shows us that love is a true emotion, but also a selfish one. In the book, he talks about how love can be self-centered because it is based on passion. However, in real life, love should not be based on passion but rather it should be based on devotion. The idea of love-based devotion comes from the idea that when in a relationship with someone, we do not care about ourselves but rather we care for our partners well-being. Loving someone should make you walk a long line through times of uncertainty and when you are in doubt or when things don't seem to go right. Love should not only be based on passion because when passion cools down eventually people will find something new to get passionate about.

Source: The Bridge Of San Luis Rey

Some Similar Quotes
  1. Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can completely turn your world around. You tell them things that you’ve never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you say and actually want to hear more. You share hopes for... - Bob Marley

  2. As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once. - John Green

  3. I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you,... - Pablo Neruda

  4. Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. - Neil Gaiman

  5. There is never a time or place for true love. It happens accidentally, in a heartbeat, in a single flashing, throbbing moment. - Sarah Dessen

More Quotes By Thornton Wilder
  1. The knowledge that she would never be loved in return acted upon her ideas as a tide acts upon cliffs.

  2. We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.

  3. There is not a single untruth, no -but after ten lines Truth shrieks, she runs distraught and disheveled through her temple's corridors; she does not know herself. 'I can endure lies, ' she cries. 'I cannot survive this stifling verisimilitude

  4. Everybody has a right to their own troubles.

  5. It required all his delicate Epicurean education to prevent his doing something about it; he had to repeat over to himself his favorite notions: that the injustice and unhappiness in the world is a constant; that the theory of progress is a delusion; that the...

Related Topics