Renunciation Quotes
More Renunciation Quotes
Aren't all beautiful things made by renunciation?
edgar degas— Quoted in P Lafond Degas (1918-9).
Courage is a moral quality; it is not a chance gift of nature, like an aptitude for games. It is a cold choice between two alternatives; the fixed resolve not to quit, an act of renunciation that must be made not once but many times by the power of the will.
— 1945 The Anatomy of Courage.
The very act of faith by which we receive Christ is an act of the utter renunciation of self, and all its works, as a ground of salvation. It is really a denial of self, and a grounding of its arms in the last citadel into which it can be driven, and is, in its principle, inclusive of every subsequent act of self-denial by which sin is forsaken or overcome.
mark hopkins— Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895, pg. 535)
The conclusion to which I am ever more clearly coming is that the only hope of attaining a true system of economics is to fling aside,once and forever, the mazy and preposterous assumptions of the Ricardian school. Our English economists have been living in a fool's paradise. The truth is with the French school, and the sooner we recognize the fact, the better it will be for all the world, except perhaps the few writers who are far too committed to the old erroneous doctrines to allow for renunciation.
william stanley jevons— Preface To The Second Edition, p. 27-28
The reward of renunciation is some good greater than the thing renounced. To renounce with no vision of such a good, from fear or in automatic obedience to a formula, is to weaken the springs of life, and to diminish the soul's resistance to this world.
hugh kingsmill— Matthew Arnold (1928) p. 89
Attention to detail and a perfectionist instinct, far from stimulating action, are character qualities that lead to renunciation. Better to dream than to be.
fernando pessoa— Ibid.
[Nietzsche inveighs] against every sort of historical optimism; but he energetically repudiates the ordinary pessimism, which is the result of degenerate or enfeebled instincts of decadence. He preaches with youthful enthusiasm the triumph of a tragic culture, introduced by an intrepid rising generation, in which the spirit of ancient Greece might be born again. He rejects the pessimism of Schopenhauer, for he already abhors all renunciation; but he seeks a pessimism of healthiness, one derived from strength, from exuberant power, and he believes he has found it in the Greeks.
georg brandes— p. 21 (An Essay on Aristocratic Radicalism (1889))
Subhas Chandra Bose: Against the dawn of 1921, there now stood not merely a whole time politician but an emancipated soul – a soul reborn. Inspired by a taste of that fullness of life which brings man nearer to divinity and consciousness of a higher duty to his nation and to humanity, he plunged into the thick of the political strife. His complete renunciation in the cause of the nation roused the affection and gratitude of his countrymen who spontaneously conferred on him the title of ‘Deshbandhu’ or ‘friend of the country’.
chittaranjan das— Collected Works of Deshbandhu.
Sarojini Naidu:;: Kingly was Deshbandhu Das in every impulse and gesture of his life, royal alike in the splendour of his bounty and the splendour of his renunciation. As the idol of the nation he served with unsurpassing devotion. To the generations of tomorrow, he will grow into a radiant figure of historic legend and romance, a vital portion of epic beauty and grandeur of their spiritual heritage.
chittaranjan das— Source: Collected Works of Deshbandhu.
If a wise man should ask, What are the modern virtues? and should answer his own question by a summary of the things we admire; if he should discard as irrelevant the ideals which by tradition we profess, but which are not found outside of the tradition or the profession ideals like meekness, humility, the renunciation of this world; if he should include only those excellences to which our hearts are daily given, and by which our conduct is motived, in such an inventory what virtues would he name?
john erskine— The Moral Obligation to be Intelligent (1915, pg. 3)
Commitment becomes hysterical when those who have nothing to give advocate generosity, and those who have nothing to give up preach renunciation.
Eric Hoffer— Section 44 (Reflections on the Human Condition (1973))
Security can be found in renunciation of ownership over people, money, and real assets; to gain, keep or protect that which others need for periods of legitimate access. A lending library enables people to help themselves to information; a locked-up book collection is useful only to the person who owns it.
bill mollison— chapter 14.2
The renunciation of war as expressed in the Japanese Constitution has given a first ray of hope to a world in darkness and despair, and men today cling to this hope passionately. Can we really do something about it or are we to stand aside as idle onlookers, unable to contribute for better or for worse?
martin niemöller— Statement for a Japanese publication (February 1954), as quoted in Martin Niemöller, 1892-1984 (1984) by James Bentley, p. 214
The act the act must not be a revenge. It must be a calm, weary renunciation, a closing of accounts, a private, rhythmic deed. The last remark.
cesare pavese— 1950-05-10
The reward of renunciation is some good greater than the thing renounced. To renounce with no vision of such a good, from fear or in automatic obedience to a formula, is to weaken the springs of life, and to diminish the soul's resistance to this world.
hugh kingsmill— Hugh Kingsmill, Matthew Arnold, p. 89 (1928)
Sri Yukteswar used to poke gentle fun at the commonly inadequate conceptions of renunciation. "A beggar cannot renounce wealth," Master would say. "If a man laments: 'My business has failed; my wife has left me; I will renounce all and enter a monastery,' to what worldly sacrifice is he referring? He did not renounce wealth and love; they renounced him!" Saints like Gandhi, on the other hand, have made not only tangible material sacrifices, but also the more difficult renunciation of selfish motive and private goal, merging their inmost being in the stream of humanity as a whole.
paramahansa yogananda— Paramahansa Yogananda, Autobiography of a Yogi, Ch. 44 - With Mahatma Gandhi At Wardha (1946)
For a Christian the oath of allegiance to any government whatever the very act which is regarded as the foundation of the existence of a state is a direct renunciation of Christianity. For the man who promises unconditional obedience in the future to laws, made or to be made, by that very promise is in the most, positive manner renouncing Christianity, which means obeying in every circumstance of life only the divine law of love he recognizes within him.
— Leo Tolstoy, in The Kingdom of God is Within You (1894), Ch. IX
The act the act must not be a revenge. It must be a calm, weary renunciation, a closing of accounts, a private, rhythmic deed. The last remark.
cesare pavese— Cesare Pavese, This Business of Living, 1950-05-10
Not by not acting in this world does one become free from action, nor does one approach perfection by renunciation only. Not even for a moment does someone exist without acting. Even against one’s will, one acts by the nature-born qualities.
— Krishna; Chapter 3, verses 4–5; Gavin Flood and Charles Martin translation
You commend, O Krishna, the renunciation of action and you also praise yoga. Tell me definitely which is the better of the two.
— Arjuna; Chapter 5, verse 1; B. Srinivasa Murthy translation
Both renunciation and the yoga of action lead to the supreme good. But of these two, performance of action is superior to the renunciation of action.
— Krishna; Chapter 5, verse 2; B. Srinivasa Murthy translation
what's the nature of asceticism, i want to know how's renunciation different
— Arjuna; Chapter 18, verse 1; Mani Rao translation
asceticism is giving up selfish activities as poets know & the wise declare renunciation is giving up fruits of action
— Krishna; Chapter 18, verse 2; Mani Rao translation
Freud’s link to a Hegelian tradition with which he otherwise shares little is in the deliberate renunciation of common sense. “A person who professes to believe in commonsense psychology,” Freud is reported saying once, “and who thinks psychoanalysis is ‘far-fetched’ can certainly have no understanding of it, for it is common sense which produces all the ills we have to cure.”
— Russell Jacoby (1975) Social Amnesia: A Critique of Conformist Psychology from Adler to Laing. p. 19-20.
The very act of faith by which we receive Christ is an act of the utter renunciation of self, and all its works, as a ground of salvation. It is really a denial of self, and a grounding of its arms in the last citadel into which it can be driven, and is, in its principle, inclusive of every subsequent act of self-denial by which sin is forsaken or overcome.
mark hopkins— Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895, p. 535)
Self-denial is the result of a calm, deliberate, invincible attachment to the highest good, flowing forth in the voluntary renunciation of every thing that is inconsistent with the glory of God or the good of our fellow men.
— Gardiner Spring, p. 535. (Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895))
The renunciation necessary for the attainment of bhakti is not obtained by killing anything, but comes naturally as in the presence of an increasingly stronger light , the less intense ones become dimmer and dimmer until they vanish away completely. So this love of pleasures of the senses and of the intellect is all made dim and thrown aside and cast into the shade by the love of God Himself.
— Swami Vivekananda, in Hindu spirituality: Postclassical and modern, p.306
