
“Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure when he is really selling himself a slave to it.”
Pt. 3, Ch. 3
Sentimental Education (1869)
“Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure when he is really selling himself a slave to it.”
Act V., Scene II. — (Cornelio).
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 274.
I Lucidi (published 1549)
"Notes on 'Camp'" (1964), note 54, p. 291
Against Interpretation and Other Essays (1966)
Context: The discovery of the good taste of bad taste can be very liberating. The man who insists on high and serious pleasures is depriving himself of pleasure; he continually restricts what he can enjoy; in the constant exercise of his good taste he will eventually price himself out of the market, so to speak. Here Camp taste supervenes upon good taste as a daring and witty hedonism. It makes the man of good taste cheerful, where before he ran the risk of being chronically frustrated. It is good for the digestion.
Un litigante è di vincer si ingordo,
Che non dà a se, o altrui pace o riposo,
Ma ad ogni altro piacer è cieco e sordo.
Satire, II., IX. — "Peccadigli degli Avvocati."
Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 432.
Gilbert Burnet History of His Own Time (London: William S. Orr, 1850)
“He who does not give himself leisure to be thirsty cannot take pleasure in drinking.”
Book I, Ch. 42
Essais (1595), Book I