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Longing Quotes

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Longing Quotes

“Tireless passion, fierce jealousy, longing to possess and crush-these alone were left of all his love for Rosalind; these remained to him as payment for the loss of his youth-bitter calomel under the thin sugar of love's exaltation.”

PassionLeftLossYouthLongingBitterCrushSugarFierceHis LovePaymentExaltation
Book:The Complete Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald: Novels, Short Stories, Poetry, Articles, Letters, Plays & Screenplays: From the author of The Great Gatsby, The Side of Paradise, Tender Is the Night, The Beautiful and Damned, The Love of the Last Tycoon, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and many other notable works
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“Toska - noun /ˈtō-skə/ - Russian word roughly translated as sadness, melancholia, lugubriousness. "No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.”

MayLongSoulSpiritualDesireCausesLevelsCasesSadnessParticularSickLongingPainfulNostalgiaBoredomDullGradesSicknessSensationsShadeYearningVagueLowestAnguishAcheRestlessnessMorbidNounsSingle WordEnnuiGreat SpiritualPining
Author:Vladimir Nabokov
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“And shall I pray Thee change Thy will, my Father, Until it be according unto mine? But, no, Lord, no, that never shall be, rather I pray Thee blend my human will with Thine. I pray Thee hush the hurrying, eager longing, I pray Thee soothe the pangs of keen desire— See in my quiet places, wishes thronging— Forbid them, Lord, purge, though it be with fire.”

HumansInspirationChristianDesireFatherWishLordFireMinesPrayingQuietLongingGods WillTheeI PrayHushHurryingHuman WillQuiet Place
Book:Mountain Breezes: The Collected Poems of Amy Carmichael
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“O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, so that I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, ‘Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away.’ Then give me grace to rise and follow Thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long.”

KnowsWantNeedsGivingMayLongMadeStillsSoulShowsDesireGracePrayingGoodnessGloryConsciousFairsMercyGive MeFilledLongingSatisfiedMy SoulTheeAshamedThirstShow MeI PrayThirstyMistyNew Work
Author:Aiden Wilson Tozer
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“Everything that the human race has done and thought is concerned with the satisfaction of deeply felt needs and the assuagement of pain. One has to keep this constantly in mind if one wishes to understand spiritual movements and their development. Feeling and longing are the motive force behind all human endeavor and human creation, in however exalted a guise the latter may present themselves to us.”

IfsNeedsMindHumansMayDonePhilosophyFeelingsPainSpiritualForceWishFeltRaceBehindsMovementCreationDevelopmentConcernedLongingSatisfactionHuman RaceMotiveLatterEndeavorExaltedGuise
Book:Ideas and Opinions
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“A thousand recollected lives were passing through her, a thousand stories - of love and work, of parents and children, of duty and joy and grief. Beds slept in and meals eaten, and the bliss and pain of the body, and a view of summer leaves from a window on a morning it had rained; the nights of loneliness and the nights of love, the soul in it's body keeping always longing to be known.”

ChildrenSoulStoriesBodyPainJoyNightParentViewsGriefKnownMorningLonelinessDutyThousandBedSummerWindowLongingPassingPassingsBlissMealsPassing ThroughChildren And ParentsJoy And Grief
Book:The Passage
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“Our holiday food splurge was a small crate of tangerines, which we found ridiculously thrilling after an eight-month abstinence from citrus.... Lily hugged each one to her chest before undressing it as gently as a doll. Watching her do that as she sat cross-legged on the floor one morning in pink pajamas, with bliss lighting her cheeks, I thought: Lucky is the world, to receive this grateful child. Value is not made of money, but a tender balance of expectation and longing.”

WorldChildrenMadeValuesFoundMorningFoodMonthsBalanceLuckyExpectationsCrossesGratefulLongingEightBlissSatHolidayChestsCheeksThrillingDollsLightingLiliesAbstinencePajamasUndressingCitrusTangerines
Author:Barbara Kingsolver
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“She couldn’t read his expression. As he started toward her, she recalled the way he’d seemed to glide through the sand the first time she’d ever seen him; she remembered their kiss on the boat dock the night of his sister’s wedding. And she heard again the words she’d said to him on the day they’d said good-bye. She was besieged by a storm of conflicting emotions—desire, regret, longing, fear, grief, love. There was so much to say, yet what could they really begin to say in this awkward setting and with so much time already passed?”

WayFirstsSaidDesireNightGriefEmotionHeardExpressionRegretKissingFirst TimeLongingStormSettingBoatSettingsRememberedSandAwkwardByeGood ByeDocksConflicting Emotions
Author:Nicholas Sparks
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“The only education in grief that any of us ever gets is a crash course. Until Caroline had died I had belonged to that other world, the place of innocence, and linear expectations, where I thught grief was a simple, wrenching realm of sadness and longing that graduallu receded. What that definition left out was the body blow that loss inflicts, as well as the temporary madness, and a range of less straightforward emotions shocking in their intensity.”

WorldWellsBodyCoursesLeftLossSimpleGriefEmotionSadnessExpectationsMadnessDiedLongingDefinitionsBlowInnocenceRangeRealmsTemporaryIntensityCrashShockingStraightforwardOther WorldsLinearLeft Out
Author:Gail Caldwell
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“I have heard what poets write about women. They rhyme and rhapsodize and lie. I have watched sailors on the shore stare mutely at the slow-rolling swell of the sea. I have watched old soldiers with hearts like leather grow teary-eyed at their king's colors stretched against the wind. Listen to me: these men know nothing of love. You will not find it in the words of poets or the longing eyes of sailors. If you want to know of love, look to a trouper's hands as he makes his music. A trouper knows.”

IfsKnowsMenWantWritingLooksHeartHandsEyeLyingGrowsHeardSeaLove YouColorPoetWindKingsLongingSoldierStaringShoreRollingRhymeLeatherSailorListen To MeOld Soldiers
Book:The Wise Man's Fear: The Kingkiller Chronicle: Day Two
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“For this is what we do. Put one foot forward and then the other. Lift our eyes to the snarl and smile of the world once more. Think. Act. Feel. Add our little consequence to the tides of good and evil that flood and drain the world. Drag our shadowed crosses into the hope of another night. Push our brave hearts into the promise of a new day. With love; the passionate search for truth other than our own. With longing; the pure, ineffable yearning to be saved. For so long as fate keeps waiting, we live on.”

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Author:Gregory David Roberts
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“I love borders. August is the border between summer and autumn; it is the most beautiful month I know. Twilight is the border between day and night, and the shore is the border between sea and land. The border is longing: when both have fallen in love but still haven't said anything. The border is to be on the way. It is the way that is the most important thing.”

KnowsWaySaidStillsImportantBeautifulNightSeaLandHavensMonthsSummerImportant ThingsLongingBordersFallenAutumnShoreTwilightAugustDay And Night
Author:Tove Jansson
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“There has never been a time in which I have been convinced from within myself that I am alive. You see, I have only such a fugitive awareness of things around me that I always feel they were once real and are now fleeting away. I have a constant longing, my dear sir, to catch a glimpse of things as they may have been before they show themselves to me.”

PeopleFeelsMayHas BeensRealShowsBeautifulTalkingAliveAwarenessLongingConstantCalmDearConvincedGlimpseFleetingFugitivePeople TalkingI Am Alive
Author:Franz Kafka
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“Why should we girls not have the same privileges as men? Why do we police ourselves so stringently- whittling each other down with cutting remarks or holding ourselves back from greatness with a harness woven of fear and shame and longing? If we do not deem ourselves worthy first, how shall we ever ask for more?”

IfsMenShouldFirstsGirlAsksCuttingGreatnessPoliceShameLongingPrivilegeWorthyRemarksWovenHarnessWhittling
Book:The Gemma Doyle Trilogy
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“He and his wife loved each other and brought each other daily pain. Everything else he was doing in his life, even his longing for Lalitha, amounted to little more than flight from circumstance. He and Patty couldn't live together and couldn't imagine living apart. Each time he thought they'd reached the unbearable breaking point, it turned out that there was still further they could go without breaking.”

LittlesStillsPainTogetherWifeImagineCircumstancesLongingFlightUnbearablePoint Break
Author:Jonathan Franzen
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“I have done what they expected of me. I have curtsied for my Queen and made my debut. This is what I have anticipated eagerly for years. So why do I feel so unsatisfied? Everyone is merry. They haven't a care in the world. And perhaps that is it. How terrible it is to have no cares, no longings. I do not fit. I feel too deeply and want too much.”

WorldWantFeelsYearsMadeDoneCareToo MuchHavensFitTerribleLongingExpectedQueensMerryDebutUnsatisfied
Book:The Sweet Far Thing
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“Celia, wait,” Marco says, standing but not moving closer to her. “You are breaking my heart. You told me once that I reminded you of your father. That you never wanted to suffer the way your mother did for him, but you are doing exactly that to me. You keep leaving me. You leave me longing for you again and again when I would give anything for you to stay, and it is killing me.” “It has to kill one of us,” Celia says quietly.”

WayGivingHeartWantedMovingMotherSufferingFatherWaitingMy HeartStandingLongingKillingLeavingAgain And AgainLeaving MeYou AgainMarcosBreaking My HeartCeliaMoving Closer
Author:Erin Morgenstern
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“He shifted over without comment, lifting the blankets, and I scrambled into the warm sheets beside him. He smelled like soap and sleep and bare skin. He smelled familiar. Not the deja vu familiar of Guy or Mel. Familiar like...the ache in your chest of homesickness, of longing for harbor after weeks of rough seas or craving a fire's warmth after snow--or wanting back something you should never have given away.”

ShouldGuyGivenSleepFireWeekSeaSkinsLongingWarmSnowFamiliarRoughChestsCommentWarmthSheetsAcheCravingSoapHarborsBlanketLiftingHomesicknessDeja VuBare SkinRough Seas
Author:Josh Lanyon
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“History overflows time. Love overflows the allowance of the world. All the vessels overflow, and no end or limit stays put. Every shakable thing has got to be shaken. In a sense, nothing that was ever lost in Port William ever has been replaced. In another sense, nothing is ever lost, and we are compacted together forever, even by our failures, our regrets, and our longings.”

WorldHas BeensEndsTogetherLostCommunityForeverRegretLimitsLongingReplacedVesselPortTime LoveOverflowAllowanceTogether Forever
Author:Wendell Berry
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“It seemed as though he gave way all at once; he was so languid that he could not control his thoughts; they would wander to her; they would bring back the scene,- not of his repulse and rejection the day before but the looks, the actions of the day before that. He went along the crowded streets mechanically, winding in and out among the people, but never seeing them, -almost sick with longing for that one half-hour-that one brief space of time when she clung to him, and her heart beat against his-to come once again.”

PeopleWayLooksHeartActionHoursSpaceHalfSeeingStreetsSceneBeatsSickLongingWanderRejectionCrowdedHalf HoursHeart BeatOne HalfHim And HerCrowded Streets
Book:The Complete Works of Elizabeth Gaskell (20+ Books)
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