As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, / I must not look to have; but, in their stead, / Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath, / Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not" (5.3.25-28).
William ShakespeareRead
In time we hate that which we often fear.
Interpretation
Fear can lead to hatred, particularly over time as one confronts what they initially feared.
This quote by William Shakespeare suggests that prolonged exposure to our fears can transform them into hatred. It highlights a psychological phenomenon where negative emotions, when left unexamined, can morph into more toxic feelings like hatred, often as a defense mechanism against vulnerability and fear.
In practice
During a discussion on how confrontation can help us overcome our fears.
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, / I must not look to have; but, in their stead, / Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath, / Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not" (5.3.25-28).
Love bears it out even to the edge of doom.
Good company, good wine, good welcome, can make good people.
Absence doth sharpen love, presence strengthens it; the one brings fuel, the other blows it till it burns clear.
Lord, Lord, how this world is given to lying!
Give it an understanding, but no tongue.
I think we live in a culture that is actually hedging all of it towards comfort and immediacy, things that scare me. All the things that they sell us as a way of life scare me.
We try to think with 'and' rather than 'or.' It doesn't have to be healthy or tasty. It can be healthy and tasty. It can be wholesome and convenient.
Curse the blasted, jelly-boned swines, the slimy, the belly-wriggling invertebrates, the miserable soddingrotters, the flaming sods, the sniveling, dribbling, dithering, palsied, pulse-less lot that make up England today. They've got white of egg in their veins, and their spunk is that watery it's a marvel they can breed.
To denounce does not free the self from what it hates, any more than ignoring the past shuts off its influence.
It's possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way.
One of the reasons why fundamentalists are so aggressive in trying to promote fundamentalism is because deep down they know it's arbitrary. If you're comfortable with your belief you don't need to convince other people to agree with you.
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