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The glutton usually realizes that gout is ever ready to pounce, and that alcohol is bad for him. But possible disaster weighs light in the scale again...more

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He could see her, but dared not remain for fear of annoying her by seeming to be spying upon the pleasures which she tasted in other company, pleasure...more

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... it was with an unusual intensity of pleasure, a pleasure destined to have a lasting effect upon his character and conduct...

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It was not evil that gave her the idea of pleasure, that seemed to her attractive; it was pleasure, rather, that seemed evil. And as, every time that ...more

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In his younger days a man dreams of possessing the heart of the woman he loves; later, the feeling that he possesses the heart of a woman may be enoug...more

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Sometimes, as Eve was born from one of Adam’s ribs, a woman was born during my sleep from a cramped position of my thigh. Formed from the pleasure I w...more

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It was not evil that gave her the idea of pleasure, that seemed to her attractive; it was pleasure, rather, that seemed evil.

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... since I was still, and must for long remain, in that period of life when one has not yet separated the fact of this sensual pleasure from the vari...more

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... I experienced, suddenly, that special pleasure, which bore no resemblance to any other...

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Unkindness is inspired by hatred, anger fuels it into action in which there is no great joy; it would take sadism to turn it into something pleasurabl...more

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... seeking to indicate to her by the extent of his gratitude the corresponding intensity of the pleasures which it was in her power to bestow on him,...more

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Sadists of Mlle Vinteuil's sort are creatures so purely sentimental, so naturally virtuous, that even sensual pleasure appears to them as something ba...more

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Among all the modes by which love is brought into being, among all the agents which disseminate that blessed bane, there are few so efficacious as thi...more

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I spent many a charming evening talking and playing with Albertine, but none so sweet as when I was watching her sleep.

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Lying is essential to humanity. It plays as large a part perhaps as the quest for pleasure, and is moreover governed by that quest. One lies in order ...more