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Word Porn: Erotic Quote on Temptation from Oscar Wilde
Happy #WordyWednesday, Lexual people. Welcome back to my playground.
Here’s your dose of Word Porn for today, from the beautiful mind of Oscar Wilde:
“The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful.”
- Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890)
Ah, temptation, my old friend.
Temptation is simply “the desire to do something, especially something wrong or unwise.” (Thanks, Oxford dictionary.)
We encounter temptation every day of our lives, in one way or another, sexually or otherwise.
Whenever external forces, such as society, the law, our workplace, religion, the boundaries of our interpersonal relationships, etc., tell us we’re not allowed or supposed to do something, it makes us want to do it ALL the more.
I’m a notorious boundary-pusher.
If it’s verboten, my desire to experience the thrill of defiance becomes nearly overpowering.
But none of us are fully guided by our “ids”, in the Freudian sense, and our sexuality does not solely dictate our behavior. We can’t just give in to everything we want all the time (even though it would feel SOOO good!). Society would cease to function completely if we continually succumbed to our every desire. It would be total chaos.
Is it not natural for all of us to feel some measure of temptation and longing, as a reminder that there is a need we have that has not been met, an experience we have not yet lived, or an imbalance in our lives somewhere that we are striving to resolve?
Are we not gluttons, in that we seem to always want more variety, more novelty, more time, more of everything, more, more?
Do you believe that when we indulge in our temptation, we can get rid of it?
Or does such an indulgence only serve to intensify our craving for that forbidden fruit, rather than alleviate our hunger?
Is it possible to safely achieve a feeling of fulfillment with minimal consequence to our actions, without feeling that we’re being controlled by the overwhelming desire to succumb to our temptations?
A little bit of critical thinking for you.
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