To love in the sense of ...

To love in the sense of passion-love is the contrary of to live. It is an impoverishment of one's being, an askesis without sequel, an inability to enjoy the present without imagining it as absent, a never-ending flight from possession.
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 Denis de Rougemont

Quotes from the same author

Happiness is indeed a Eurydice, vanishing as soon as gazed upon. It can exist only in acceptance, and succumbs as soon as it is laid claim to.
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 Denis de Rougemont
What stirs lyrical poets to their finest flights is neither the delight of the senses nor the fruitful contentment of the settled couple; not the satisfaction of love, but its passion. And passion means suffering.
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 Denis de Rougemont
One possessed a thousand and three women (in Spain alone), the other only one. But it is multiplicity that is impoverished, whilethe entire world is concentrated in a single being infinitely possessed. Tristan no longer needs the world--because he loves! While Don Juan, always loved, cannot love in return. Hence his anguish and his frenzied course.
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 Denis de Rougemont