Egotism
Egotism is the drive to maintain and enhance favorable views of oneself, and generally features an inflated opinion of one's personal qualities and intellectual, physical, or social importance. Extreme egotism involves little or no concern for others, including those loved or considered as "close," in any other terms except those set by the egotist.
Quotes
- We are, the great spiritual writers insist, most fully ourselves when we give ourselves away, and it is egotism that holds us back from that transcendent experience that has been called God, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao.
- Karen Armstrong, in The Spiral Staircase : My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)
- Egoist: a person of low taste, more interested in himself than me.
- Ambrose Bierce, in The Cynic's Word Book (1906). Retitled The Devil’s Dictionary (1911).
- It is never permissible to say, I say.
- Madame Necker; reported in Louis Klopsch, ed., Many Thoughts of Many Minds: A Treasury of Quotations From the Literature of Every Land and Every Age (1896), p. 80
Unsourced
- Egotism is the anesthetic given by a kindly nature to relieve the pain of being a damn fool.
- When all is summed up, a man never speaks of himself without loss; his accusations of himself are always believed, his praises never.
- Be your character what it will, it will be known; and nobody will take it upon your word.
- We would rather speak ill of ourselves than not to talk of ourselves at all.
- The more you speak of yourself, the more you are likely to lie.
- What hypocrites we seem to be whenever we talk of ourselves! Our words sound so humble, while our hearts are so proud.
- The more anyone speaks of himself, the less he likes to hear another talked of.
- Do you wish men to speak well of you? Then never speak well of yourself.
- He who thinks he can find in himself the means of doing without others is much mistaken; but he who thinks that others cannot do without him is still more mistaken.
- Egotism is the anaesthetic that dulls the pains of stupidity.
