“The desire for security, very marked in women, draws the weaker among them to men who, by their strength or ability, seem to offer protection and support. In time of war they count a warrior's scalps; in time of peace they hunt for genius or wealth. To the man in love the giving of gifts is a way of asserting his power. The penguin and the banker offer pebbles of varying brilliance to their respective loved ones. The finch presents twigs and leaves to its mate as the young man presents woolen threads in the form of carpets and curtains to his fiancee. The swallow and the woman begin to thing of the nest the moment they have chosen their males.”

—  André Maurois

Un Art de Vivre (The Art of Living) (1939), The Art of Loving

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The desire for security, very marked in women, draws the weaker among them to men who, by their strength or ability, se…" by André Maurois?
André Maurois photo
André Maurois202
French writer 1885–1967

Related quotes

Letitia Elizabeth Landon photo

“… oh! love will last
When all that made it happiness is past,—
When all its hopes are as the glittering toys
Time present offers, time to come destroys”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

Juliet after the Masquerade. By Thompson
The Troubadour (1825)

“Love is a power, a mighty principle that exists in its own right independent of any individual. Man changes, but the principle of love does not and cannot. Love does not leave men and women. Men and women leave love.”

Barry Long (1926–2003) Australian spiritual teacher and writer

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

Warren Farrell photo

“Women's scars and rituals involved beauty (piercing ears and noses, binding feet, and wearing corsets); men's involved protecting women. In cultures in which physical strength is still the best way to protect women, as among the Dodos in Uganda, each time a man kills a man, he is awarded a ritual scar; the more scars, the more he is considered eligible.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part 1: The Myth of Male Power, p. 72.

Esther Perel photo

“Love is a vessel that contains both security and adventure, and commitment offers one of the great luxuries of life: time. Marriage is not the end of romance, it is the beginning.”

Esther Perel (1958) Belgian Psychotherapist and Author

Source: Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic

“[A] balance sheet is a snapshot of one moment in time, and thus presents a very limited view... To be a good banker, therefore, a business is much more than its balance sheet.”

Henry Kaufman (1927) American economist

On Money and Markets (2000)

“She is young. Have I the right
Even to name her? Child,
It is not love I offer
Your quick limbs, your eyes;
Only the barren homage
Of an old man whom time
Crucifies.”

R.S. Thomas (1913–2000) Welsh poet

"The Dance"
Pietá (1966)

“A romantic man often feels more uplifted with two women than with one: his love seems to hit the ideal mark somewhere between two different faces.”

Elizabeth Bowen book The Death of the Heart

Source: The Death of the Heart

Morihei Ueshiba photo

“The real Way of a Warrior is to prevent such slaughter — it is the Art of Peace, the power of love.”

Morihei Ueshiba (1883–1969) founder of aikido

Speaking of a vision of the "Great Spirit of Peace" in 1942, during World War II, as quoted in Adjusting Though Reflex : Romancing Zen (2010) by Rodger Hyodo, p. 76
Context: The Way of the Warrior has been misunderstood. It is not a means to kill and destroy others. Those who seek to compete and better one another are making a terrible mistake. To smash, injure, or destroy is the worst thing a human being can do. The real Way of a Warrior is to prevent such slaughter — it is the Art of Peace, the power of love.

Jean Jacques Rousseau photo

“There is only one man who gets his own way—he who can get it single-handed; therefore freedom, not power, is the greatest good. That man is truly free who desires what he is able to perform, and does what he desires. This is my fundamental maxim. Apply it to childhood, and all the rules of education spring from it. Society has enfeebled man, not merely by robbing him of the right to his own strength, but still more by making his strength insufficient for his needs. This is why his desires increase in proportion to his weakness; and this is why the child is weaker than the man. If a man is strong and a child is weak it is not because the strength of the one is absolutely greater than the strength of the other, but because the one can naturally provide for himself and the other cannot. Thus the man will have more desires and the child more caprices, a word which means, I take it, desires which are not true needs, desires which can only be satisfied with the help of others.”

Jean Jacques Rousseau book Emile, or On Education

Emile, or On Education (1762), Book II

Related topics