Love quotes
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Stephen Chbosky photo

“Lights on buildings and everything that makes you wonder.”

Source: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Jane Austen photo
Paul Tillich photo

“The first duty of love is to listen.”

Paul Tillich (1886–1965) German-American theologian and philosopher
Maya Angelou photo
Stephen Chbosky photo
Thich Nhat Hanh photo
André Breton photo

“All my life my heart has yearned for a thing I cannot name.” andre breton”

André Breton (1896–1966) French writer

Variant: All my life, my heart has yearned for a thing I cannot name.
Source: Mad Love

Lucille Ball photo

“Love yourself first and everything else falls into line. You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.”

Lucille Ball (1911–1989) American actress and businesswoman

Variant: Love yourself first and everything else falls into line. Your really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.

Marilyn Monroe photo
Marilyn Monroe photo

“Always, always, always believe in yourself, because if you don't, then who will, sweetie”

Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer

Variant: Keep trying, hold on, and always, always, always believe in yourself, because if you don't, then who will?

“You love life because life's all there is.”

Glen Duncan (1965) British writer

Source: The Last Werewolf

Christopher Marlowe photo

“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?”

First Sestiad. The same statement occurs in As You Like It (1600) by William Shakespeare, and a similar one in The Blind Beggar of Alexandria (1596) by George Chapman.
Hero and Leander (published 1598)
Variant: Where both deliberate, the love is slight; Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?

Woody Allen photo
James Baldwin photo
Elizabeth Gilbert photo
Jane Austen photo

“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.”

Sam Keen (1931) author, professor, and philosopher

Variant: Love isn't finding a perfect person. It's seeing an imperfect person perfectly.
Source: To Love and Be Loved

Thomas Carlyle photo

“A loving heart is the beginning of all knowledge.”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

Article on Biography.
1820s, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays (1827–1855)
Variant: For love is ever the beginning of Knowledge, as fire is of light.

Nicholas Sparks photo
James Thurber photo

“Love is what you've been through with somebody”

James Thurber (1894–1961) American cartoonist, author, journalist, playwright
Ani DiFranco photo
Leo Buscaglia photo
Henry David Thoreau photo
Elizabeth Gilbert photo
F. Scott Fitzgerald photo

“The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and let it come in”

Morrie Schwartz (1916–1995) American sociologist

Source: Morrie: In His Own Words

Elizabeth Barrett Browning photo

“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.”

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–1861) English poet, author

Source: Selected Poems

Mitch Albom photo
Marilyn Monroe photo
Thich Nhat Hanh photo
Woody Allen photo
Ralph Waldo Emerson photo

“Immortality. I notice that as soon as writers broach this question they begin to quote. I hate quotation. Tell me what you know.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

May 1849: This is a remark Emerson wrote referring to the unreliability of second hand testimony and worse upon the subject of immortality. It is often taken out of proper context, and has even begun appearing on the internet as "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know" or sometimes just "I hate quotations".
1820s, Journals (1822–1863)
Source: The Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Anaïs Nin photo
Margaret Mitchell photo

“You should be kissed and often, by someone who knows how.”

Variant: You should be kissed and by someone who knows how.
Source: Gone with the Wind

Nicholas Sparks photo
Erich Fromm photo

“Immature love says: "I love you because I need you." Mature love says: "I need you because I love you."”

Variant: Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.' Mature love say: 'i need you because I love you.
Source: The Art of Loving (1956), Ch. 2

Paulo Coelho photo

“The opposite of love is not hate. It is indifference.”

Christopher Pike (1954) American author Kevin Christopher McFadden

Source: Black Blood

Leo Buscaglia photo
Nicholas Sparks photo
Baz Luhrmann photo

“The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.”

Baz Luhrmann (1962) Australian film director, screenwriter and producer

Source: Moulin Rouge!: The Splendid Book That Charts the Journey of Baz Luhrmann's Motion Picture

Carl Sagan photo
Percy Bysshe Shelley photo

“Familiar acts are beautiful through love.”

The Earth, Act IV, l. 403
Prometheus Unbound (1818–1819; publ. 1820)

Elizabeth Gilbert photo

“People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life.”

Source: Eat, Pray, Love (2006)
Context: People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life.
A true soul mate is probably the most important person you'll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then leave.
A soul mates purpose is to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life, then introduce you to your spiritual master…

Woody Allen photo

“Organized crime in America takes in over forty billion dollars a year and spends very little on office supplies.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician
François Lelord photo
Erich Segal photo
Alice Sebold photo
Jane Austen photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy to a friend.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1950s, Loving Your Enemies (Christmas 1957)
Context: A third reason why we should love our enemies is that love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity. By its very nature, love creates and builds up. Love transforms with redemptive power.

William Hazlitt photo

“The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"The Times Newspaper"
Political Essays (1819)

Ingrid Bergman photo

“A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous.”

Ingrid Bergman (1915–1982) Film actress from Sweden

"Webster's Electronic Quotebase," ed. Keith Mohler, 1994

Woody Allen photo

“If God exists, I hope he has a good excuse.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician
Marilyn Monroe photo
Sarah Dessen photo
Victor Hugo photo

“The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved.”

Variant: Life's great happiness is to be convinced we are loved.
Source: Les Misérables

Ella Wheeler Wilcox photo

“All love that has not friendship for its base,
Is like a mansion built upon the sand.”

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850–1919) American author and poet

Love
Poetry quotes, New Thought Pastels (1913)

Paulo Coelho photo
David Foster Wallace photo

“How odd I can have all this inside me and to you it’s just words.”

Source: The Pale King (2011)

William Ewart Gladstone photo

“We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessings of peace.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Attributed in The National elementary principal https://books.google.com/books?id=T8YVAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Then+will+our+world+know+the+blessings+of+peace.%22&dq=%22Then+will+our+world+know+the+blessings+of+peace.%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj1iNCMvcHLAhUMcz4KHXvcCt84MhDoAQgfMAE (1948) - Volume 28 - Page 34; a similar statement has also become attributed to Jimi Hendrix: "When the power of love overcomes love of power the world will know peace." A similar quotation is found in My Heart Shall Give A Oneness-Feast (1993) by Sri Chinmoy: "My books, they all have only one message: the heart's Power Of Love must replace the mind's Love Of Power. If I have the Power Of Love, then I shall claim the whole World as my own … World Peace can be achieved when the Power Of Love replaces the Love Of Power." An even earlier statement of Chinmoy is found in Meditations: Food For The Soul (1970): "When the power of love replaces the love of power, man will have a new name: God."
Disputed
Variant: We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessings of peace.

Albert Einstein photo

“Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Variant: You can't blame gravity for falling in love.

Woody Allen photo

“Harry: Tradition is the illusion of permanence.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

Deconstructing Harry (1997)

Maya Angelou photo
Nicholas Sparks photo
Woody Allen photo

“Eternal nothingness is O. K. if you're dressed for it.”

Getting Even (1971), My Philosophy
Variant: Eternal nothingness is fine if you happen to be dressed for it.

Chinmayananda Saraswati photo

“To love and to be loved is the greatest happiness.”

Chinmayananda Saraswati (1916–1993) Indian spiritual teacher

Quotations from Gurudev’s teachings, Chinmya Mission Chicago

John Green photo

“As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep; Slowly, and then all at once.”

Hazel Grace Lancaster, p. 125
Compare Ernest Hemingway, speaking about the process of going bankrupt: "'Gradually and then suddenly.'"
The Fault in Our Stars (2012)

Confucius photo

“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Misattributed to Confucius since at least 1985; correct origins are dubious, as mentioned in "Choose a Job You Love, and You Will Never Have To Work a Day in Your Life" at QuoteInvestigator.com (2 September 2014) http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/09/02/job-love/: the oldest English-language use of the proverb has been found in Woolfolk, Ann, "Toshiko Takaezu," Princeton Alumni Weekly, Vol. 83(5), 6 October 1982, p. 32: "Find something you love to do and you’ll never have to work a day in your life." (attributed to Arthur Szathmary, who attributes it, in his turn, to an unnamed source).
Misattributed, Not Chinese

Emanuel Swedenborg photo

“Man knows that love is, but not what it is.”

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772) Swedish 18th century scientist and theologian

Divine Love and Wisdom #1

Albert Einstein photo

“Falling in love is not at all the most stupid thing that people do — but gravitation cannot be held responsible for it.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Jotted (in German) on the margins of a letter to him (1933), p. 56
Unsourced variants: Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love. / You can't blame gravity for falling in love.
Attributed in posthumous publications, Albert Einstein: The Human Side (1979)

Sophie Swetchine photo

“To love deeply in one direction makes us more loving in all others”

Sophie Swetchine (1782–1857) Russian salon-holder

Source: Reported in, "Transform Your Life: 52 Brilliant Ideas for Becoming the Person You Want to Be" by Penny Ferguson, p. 167.

Ferenc Dávid photo

“We need not think alike to love alike.”

Ferenc Dávid (1510–1579) Hungarian noble

This attribution seems to have begun in the 1960s, and has been debunked at "Who really said that?" by Peter Hughes at UU World (15 August 2012) http://www.uuworld.org/ideas/articles/229844.shtml; previously misattributed in A Chosen Faith (1991) by John A. Buehrens; also in Unitarian Universalist Origins: Our Historic Faith by Mark W. Harris https://web.archive.org/web/20060101061859/www.uua.org/info/origins.html
Misattributed

“The world is not the way they tell you it is.”

George Goodman (1930–2014) American author and economics commentator

Source: The Money Game (1968), Chapter 1, Why Did The master Say "Game"?, p. 3

Francesco Petrarca photo
W. Somerset Maugham photo

“The love that lasts longest is the love that is never returned.”

W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) British playwright, novelist, short story writer

Source: A Writer's Notebook (1946), p. 13

Nico photo

“You are beautiful and you are alone.”

Nico (1938–1988) German musician, model and actress, one of Warhol's superstars

Afraid

Rollo May photo

“Hate is not the opposite of love; apathy is.”

Source: Love and Will (1969), Ch. 1 : Introduction : Our Schizoid World, p. 29