If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous conclusions: but we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I take this that you call love to be a sect or scion.
– William Shakespeare
Othello, Act 1, Scene 3. Iago offers this cynical definition of love: it is simply an offshoot – "sect or scion" – of lust. He is responding to Roderigo’s threat of suicide over his unrequited love for Desdemona. He tells the depressed Roderigo that if we didn’t have reason, our passions and emotions would bring havoc to our lives. That is why we have reason to control our raging passions and impulses.