Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
“I now defend myself from temperance as I used to do against voluptuousness,” Montaigne admitted. “Wisdom has its excesses and has no less need of moderation than folly.”
Spinoza accepted this exile without the least objection, remarking only that it left him freer to pursue his researches without distraction.
David Abram • Becoming Animal
self-abnegating
Paul Murray • The Bee Sting: Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2023
It is our indulgences that make us go into a frenzy, becoming enraged at anything that doesn’t suit our whim.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca • Letters on Ethics: To Lucilius (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca)
I am susceptible to frivolity. I know this about myself. I love beauty; I am weak to surfaces; I am apt to mistake eccentricity for character. I drink more than I should. I love overdressing; I love staying up past midnight; I love breakfasts at all-night diners, and the Irish coffees you order when you can’t decide whether it’s night or morning.
Isabella Burton • On Good Parties
As a youth he showed great power of self-control, by abstaining from all sensual pleasures in spite of his vehement and passionate nature; while his intense desire for fame rendered him serious and high-minded beyond his years.
Plutarch • Parallel Lives: Complete
apostates.
William Finnegan • Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life
what you must do is not add to his pleasure but subtract from his desires.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca • Letters on Ethics: To Lucilius (The Complete Works of Lucius Annaeus Seneca)
I lived wild, or as wild as one could be with a warm living room to return to.