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1 " Across the centuries the moral systems from medival chivalry to Bruce Springsteen love anthems have worked the same basic way. They take immediate selfish interests and enmesh them within transcendent, spiritual meanings. Love becomes a holy cause, an act of self-sacrifice and selfless commitment.But texting and the utilitarian mind-set are naturally corrosive toward poetry and imagination. A coat of ironic detachment is required for anyone who hopes to withstand the brutal feedback of the marketplace. In today's world, the choice of a Prius can be a more sanctified act than the choice of an erotic partner.This does not mean that young people today are worse or shallower than young people in the past. It does mean they get less help. People once lived within a pattern of being, which educated the emotions, guided the temporary toward the permanent and linked everyday urges to higher things. The accumulated wisdom of the community steered couples as they tried to earn each other's commitment.Today there are fewer norms that guide that way. Today's technology seems to threaten the sort of recurring and stable reciprocity that is the building block of trust. "
2 " the great lack of parity between husbands and wives has always been spawned by the disproportionate degree of self-sacrifice that women are willing to make on behalf of those they love. "
― Elizabeth Gilbert , Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage
3 " Christ is our all. He is everything to the Christian. He fills all, is in all, and He is our life (Colossians 3:4, 11). It is in Him that all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden (Colossians 2:3). He is the author and finisher of our salvation, the one who starts it, works it out, and completes it (Hebrews 12:2). This is as the Father wanted it. He places His people in the hands of the Son, having joined them to the Son in a super-natural union, so the Son, by His perfect life of obedience, and perfect act of self-sacrifice upon the cross, can bring about their full and complete salvation. "
― James R. White , Drawn By The Father
4 " We could see that our mothers blackmailed us with self-sacrifice, even if we did not know whether or not they might have been great opera stars or toasts of the town if they had not borne us. In our intractable moments we pointed out that we had not asked to be born, or even to go to an expensive school. We knew that they must have had motives of their own for what they did with us and to us. The notion of our parents' self-sacrifice filled us not with gratitude but with confusion and guilt. We wanted them to be happy yet they were sad and deprived and it was our fault. "
― Germaine Greer , The Female Eunuch
5 " Saddest of all are the woman who were brought up to believe that self-sacrifice is the highest female virtue. "
― Jeanette Winterson , Art and Lies
6 " Loyalty and devotion lead to bravery. Bravery leads to the spirit of self-sacrifice. The spirit of self-sacrifice creates trust in the power of love. "
― Morihei Ueshiba
7 " We have to make these young people (of the Depression) feel that they are necessary. (They should be given) " certain things for which youth craves – the chance for self-sacrifice for an ideal. "
8 " And what is justice? The princess thought of that proud word 'justice'. All the complex laws of man centered for her in one clear and simple law—the law of love and self-sacrifice taught us by Him who lovingly suffered for mankind though He Himself was God. What had she to do with justice or injustice of other people? She had to endure and love, and that she did. "
― Leo Tolstoy , War and Peace
9 " Perhaps the most dangerous by-product of the Age of Intellect is the unconscious growth of the idea that the human brain can solve the problems of the world. Even on the low level of practical affairs this is patently untrue. Any small human activity, the local bowls club or the ladies’ luncheon club, requires for its survival a measure of self-sacrifice and service on the part of the members. In a wider national sphere, the survival of the nation depends basically on the loyalty and self‑sacrifice of the citizens. The impression that the situation can be saved by mental cleverness, without unselfishness or human self-dedication, can only lead to collapse. "
― John Bagot Glubb , The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival
10 " The only honorable, desirable kind of fear that shouldn't be feared is the fear of harm on a loved one. It's the kind of fear that leads to self-sacrifice and the kind of fear where you would truly jump in front of a bus to save another. "
― Criss Jami , Diotima, Battery, Electric Personality
11 " I only wanted to suggest to you that self-sacrifice is a passion so overwhelming that beside it even lust and hunger are trifling. "
― W. Somerset Maugham , The Razor's Edge
12 " No fine work can be done without concentration and self-sacrifice and toil and doubt. "
― Max Beerbohm
13 " The world will never have lasting peace so long as men reserve for war the finest human qualities. Peace, no less than war, requires idealism and self-sacrifice and a righteous and dynamic faith. "
14 " For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice - no paper currency, no promises to pay, but the gold of real service. "
15 " In Christ we see a maturity of love that flowers in self-sacrifice and forgiveness; a maturity of power that never swerves from the ideal of service; a maturity of goodness that overcomes every temptation, and, of course, we see the ultimate victory of life over death itself. "
16 " Gentleness, self-sacrifice and generosity are the exclusive possession of no one race or religion. "
― Mahatma Gandhi
17 " In the military, you learn the essence of people. You see so many examples of self-sacrifice and moral courage. In the rest of life, you don't get that many opportunities to be sure of your friends. "
