Inspirational Quotes on Selfishness

“It is a great mistake to suppose that a woman with no heart will be an easy creditor in the exchange of affection. There is not on earth a more merciless extractor of love from others than a thoroughly selfish woman; and the more unlovely she grows, the more jealously and scrupulously she extracts love, to the uttermost farthing.”

“The instructive admonitions, “give an account of thy stewardship,“—“occupy till I come;” are forgotten. Thus the generous and wakeful spirit of Christian Benevolence, seeking and finding every where occasions for its exercise, is exploded, and a system of decent selfishness is avowedly established in its stead; a system scarcely more to be abjured for its impiety, than to be abhorred for its cold insensibility to the opportunities of diffusing happiness.”

“Sin and love are exact opposites. Love is benefiting others at the expense of yourself. Sin is benefiting yourself at the expense of others. Sin is selfishness; love is selflessness.”

“When the same qualities which we admire in ourselves are seen in others, even though they be superior, maliciously lower and carp at them.”

“We are not only contingent beings, dependent on the love and will of a Creator whom we cannot know experientially except in so far as he reveals to us our personal relationship with him as his sons - we are also sinners who have FREELY REPUDIATED this relationship. We have rebelled against him. The spirit of rebellious refusal persists in our heart even when we try to return to him. Much could be said, at this point, about all the subtlety and ingenuity of religious egoism which is one of the worst and most ineradicable forms of self-deception. Sometimes one feels that a well-intentioned and inculpable atheist is in many ways better off - and gives more glory to God - than some people whose bigoted complacency and inhumanity to others are signs of the most obvious selfishness! Hence we not only need to recover an awareness of our creaturehood; we also must repair the injury done to truth and to love by this repudiation, this infidelity. But how? Humanly speaking, there is no way in which we can do this.”

“However sweet the word may sound, any sectarian boasting is but the babbling of a babe. The divisions in the church are due to no other cause than to lack of love and walking after the flesh.”

“By nature, we get more pleasure from God's gifts then from Himself.”

“If you believe what you like in the gospels, and reject what you don't like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself.”

“More than once Jesus deliberately addressed certain issues that quickly diminished the number of onlookers. It was commitment that thinned the ranks.”

“Our infinite obligations to God do not fill our hearts half as much as a petty uneasiness of our own; nor his infinite perfections as much as our smallest wants.”

“If I live for self, I can only live for one; if I live for others, I can live for 3,000,000,000.”

“Inordinate desires commonly produce irregular endeavors. If our wishes be not kept in submission to God's providence, our pursuits will scarcely be kept under the restraints of his precepts.”

“Self is the great antichrist and anti-God in the world, that sets up itself above all else.”

“Deliver me, O Lord, from that evil man, myself.”

“God wills for us to be attached to nothing aside from Him, whether it be man or a thing or even something conferred on us by Himself.”

“Nothing cures ingratitude as quickly as a good memory.”

“Our own interests are still an exquisite means for dazzling our eyes agreeably.”

“How could we enjoy heaven if during our lifetime we had used most of our time, treasure, and talents for ourselves and our select group?”

“The greatest mistake any Christian can make is to substitute his own will for the will of God.”

“There is nothing in this world so empty as getting what you want.”