Today we love what tomorrow we hate; today we seek what tomorrow we shun; to-day we desire what tomorrow we fear.

Answer: These beautiful lines occur in Chapter 14 of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. Here through these words of Crusoe, Defoe depicts a true picture of the contradictory nature of human beings.

Crusoe longed for long to be in touch with human company. Because he suffered from loneliness being cut off from “human society.” But when he found a man’s naked footprint on the sand of the beach of the island, he is overwhelmed with horror and apprehension. He is now afraid of the symptom of human existence on the island whereas formerly he himself aspired to put an end to the ‘silent life’ being blessed it, he wants to ‘shun’ what he once strongly sought and desired.

These lines express a universal truth that human beings immediately change their expectations and desire for the fulfillment of the one they wished for.