Interpersonal Relationships

"Love is the last of the virtues to be born in the heart, but it is the first in value."

"He drew a circle that shut me out — Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But Love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle that took him in."

"To him she seemed so beautiful, so seductive, so different from ordinary people, that he could not understand why no one was as disturbed as he by the clicking of her heels on the paving stones, why no one else's heart was wild with the breeze stirred by the sighs of her veils, why everyone did not go mad with the movements of her braid, the flight of her hands, the gold of her laughter. He had not missed a single one of her gestures, not one of the indications of her character, but he did not dare approach her for fear of destroying the spell."

"Henceforth I will look upon all things with love and I will be born again. I will love the sun for it warms my bones; yet I will love the rain for it cleanses my spirit. I will love the light for it shows me the way; yet I will love the darkness for it shows me the stars. I will welcome happiness because it enlarges my heart; yet I will endure sadness because it opens my soul. I will acknowledge rewards because they are my due; yet I will welcome obstacles because they are my challenge. I will greet this day with love in my heart."

"Socrates … said the subtlest thing of all: that the lover was nearer the divine than the beloved."

"If you conclude, as I do, that the only hope of a permanent peace and happiness for humanity on this planet is an increased expression of love, and that women are the primary carriers of this great force, one of the problems we face is to provide women with more opportunity for using their love powers. The last six thousand years have demonstrated quite conclusively, I believe, that woman under the domination of man can increase but meagerly the world's total love supply. Our obvious goal, than must be to devise social mechanisms whereby man is brought under the love domination of woman."

"Gamble everything for love, if you are a true human being."

"Contrary to Pascal's saying, we don't love qualities, we love persons; sometimes by reason of their defects as well as of their qualities."

"Are you fleeing from Love because of a single humiliation? What do you know of Love except the name? Love has a hundred forms of pride and disdain, and is gained by a hundred means of persuasion. Since Love is loyal, it purchases one who is loyal: it has no interest in a disloyal companion. The human being resembles a tree; its root is a covenant with God: that root must be cherished with all one's might."

"Love makes you do the wacky."

"Now there's no point in placing the blame And you should know I'd suffer the same If I lose you my heart will be broken Love is a bird... she needs to fly Let all the hurt inside of you die You're frozen when your heart's not open If I could melt your heart We'd never be apart Give yourself to me You hold the key"

"Love is the ark appointed for the righteous, Which annuls the danger and provides a way of escape. Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment. Cleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment intuition."

"One plus one equals both."

"Come, seek, for search is the foundation of fortune: every success depends upon focusing the heart."

"We love what we love. Reason does not enter into it. In many ways, unwise love is the truest love. Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect."

"Let the beauty of what you love be what you do."

"One makes mistakes; that is life. But it is never a mistake to have loved."

"A mature person is one who does not think only in absolutes, who is able to be objective even when deeply stirred emotionally, who has learned that there is both good and bad in all people and all things, and who walks humbly and deals charitably with the circumstances of life, knowing that in this world no one is all-knowing and therefore all of us need both love and charity."

"What is the body? That shadow of a shadow of your love, that somehow contains the entire universe."

"Love all love. Hate all hate."

"No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite."

"It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death. (1 April 1939)"

"I am sending all my love and support in this difficult time of the struggles of the spirit. You are surrounded by constant care. Do not doubt it. Every pupil is dear to the Teacher. Every movement of your heart echoes to the Great Heart. Not always can the projected rays reach our physical consciousness; but every minute they dispel and annihilate so many hostile sparks around you."

"In wise India, the exclusive love for one's own child is considered as one of the types of animal egotism. When there are so many unfortunate orphans around us, can we be so indifferent as not to find great motherly feeling toward them? With "her deep love for children" could not this woman then adopt one of these unfortunate homeless orphans and thus satisfy her love for children? There would be so much nobility in such an act, and (who knows?) perhaps she would bring up her true son or daughter."

"Someone declares that "in the New Era a mother must love another's child as much as her own." This statement is much too strong, and therefore not convincing. It is impossible to demand superhuman feelings from an earthly mother. Let us leave her with her natural right to love her own child more. But we may add that a true mother will find room in her heart also for another's child. All children should be dear to her all-embracing heart. The excluding love is terrible, but the containing love will have its gradations."

"Universal love is really the way of the sage-kings. It is what gives peace to the rulers and sustenance to the people. The gentleman would do well to understand and practise universal love; then he would be gracious as a ruler, loyal as a minister, affectionate as a father, filial as a son, courteous as an elder brother, and respectful as a younger brother. So, if the gentleman desires to be a gracious ruler, a loyal minister, an affectionate father, a filial son, a courteous elder brother, and a respectful younger brother, universal love must be practised. It is the way of the sage-kings and the great blessing of the people."

"Love said to me, there is nothing that is not me. Be silent."

"I will make love my greatest weapon and none on whom I call can defend against its force. My reasoning they may counter; my speech they may distrust; my apparel they may disapprove; my face they may reject; and even my bargains may cause them suspicion; yet my love will melt all hearts liken to the sun whose rays soften the coldest clay. I will greet this day with love in my heart."

"Life on earth is a hand-to-hand mortal combat... between the law of love and the law of hate."

"Love rests on no foundation. It is an endless ocean, with no beginning or end."

"The Ruling Principle of the Universe is one of Harmony and Love—God is Love. Therefore, if we wish to embody the most ancient axiom, "as above, so below," we should become unified precisely upon this principle of love and should be subordinate to it, regarding it as our only boundless Ruler."

"To love means to open ourselves to the negative as well as the positive — to grief, sorrow, and disappointment as well as to joy, fulfillment, and an intensity of consciousness we did not know was possible before."

"Let the lover be disgraceful, crazy, absent-minded. Someone sober will worry about events going badly. Let the lover be."

"This is a gathering of Lovers. In this gathering there is no high, no low, no smart, no ignorant, no special assembly, no grand discourse, no proper schooling required. There is no master, no disciple. This gathering is more like a drunken party, full of tricksters, fools, mad men and mad women. This is a gathering of Lovers."

"If you believe in peace, act peacefully; if you believe in love, acting lovingly; if you believe every which way, then act every which way, that's perfectly valid — but don't go out trying to sell your beliefs to the system. You end up contradicting what you profess to believe in, and you set a bum example. If you want to change the world, change yourself."

"If we have the heart of a mother or, more precisely, if we set out to have the heart of the Mother par excellence: Mary, we will always be ready to love. [...] Using language that is quite familiar today, we can say that love knows “no form of discrimination.”"

"I’m not quite twenty, but, thanks to you, I’ve learned something that many women these days never learn: Prince Charming really is a toad. And the Beautiful Princess has halitosis. The bottom line is that (a) people are never perfect, but love can be, (b) that is the one and only way that the mediocre and the vile can be transformed, and (c) doing that makes it that. Loving makes love. Loving makes itself. We waste time looking for the perfect lover instead of creating the perfect love. Wouldn’t that be the way to make love stay?"

"The words "God is love" have this deep meaning: that everything that is against love is ultimately doomed and damned."

"L’amour est à réinventer, on le sait."

"Love is the ultimate outlaw. It just won’t adhere to any rules. The most any of us can do is to sign on as its accomplice. Instead of vowing to honor and obey, maybe we should swear to aid and abet. That would mean that security is out of the question. The words “make” and “stay” become inappropriate. My love for you has no strings attached. I love you for free."

"Let the young lovers know that the ideal is the only safe bond. In the difficult night the youth knows his beloved by the light she carries and she him."

"I don't know how to love him."

"No matter how much others might love you, you can’t love yourself unless you’re in charge of your own actions, and you’ll never take charge as long as you can get away with blaming your shortcomings and misfortunes on your family or society or your race or gender or Satan or whatever…"

"Love isn't how you feel. It's what you do."

"Underneath a starry sky Time was still but hours must really have rushed by I didn't realize But love was in your eyes I really should have gone But love went on and on"

"I can't compete with a memory How can I fight with someone that I can't see? There's two of us but it feels like three I wish her ghost would just let us be Boy you're everything I ever wanted But I got to let you go 'cause this love is Haunted."

"The holiness of the real Is always there, accessible In total immanence. The nodes Of transcendence coagulate In you, the experiencer, And in the other, the lover."

"How can I tell the signals and the signs By which one heart another heart divines? How can I tell the many thousand ways By which it keeps the secret it betrays?"

"Now I know surely and forever, However much I have blotted our Waking love, its memory is still there. And I know the web, the net, The blind and crippled bird. For then, for One brief instant it was not blind, nor Trapped, not crippled. For one heart beat the Heart was free and moved itself. O love, I who am lost and damned with words, Whose words are a business and an art, I have no words. These words, this poem, this Is all confusion and ignorance. But I know that coached by your sweet heart, My heart beat one free beat and sent Through all my flesh the blood of truth."

"Love makes its record in deeper colors as we grow out of childhood into manhood; as the Emperors signed their names in green ink when under age, but when of age, in purple."