Great Throughts Treasury

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.

Related Quotes

Shlomo Wolbe, aka Wilhelm Wolbe

From the very beginning of a person’s life one learns that the purpose of life is not uninterrupted pleasure. Every infant suffers pains and illnesses. We should not perceive illness and pain as negative. Suffering teaches us humility. We learn that we do not have complete power over ourselves.

Beginning | Character | Humility | Life | Life | Pain | Pleasure | Power | Purpose | Purpose | Suffering | Learn |

Martin Bentzel von Sternau und Hohenau

Candor is the seal of a noble mind, the ornament and pride of man, the sweetest charm of woman, the scorn of a rascal and the rarest virtue of sociability.

Candor | Character | Man | Mind | Pride | Virtue | Virtue | Woman |

Henry Adams, aka Henry Brooks Adams

The effect of power and publicity on all men is the aggravation of self, a sort of tumor that ends by killing the victim’s sympathies.

Character | Ends | Men | Power | Self |

Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

To live happily is an inward power of the soul.

Character | Power | Soul |

Meher Baba, born Merwan Sheriar Irani

Love has to spring spontaneously from within. It is no way amenable to any form of inner or outer force. Love and coercion can never go together; but though Love cannot be forced on anyone, It can be awakened in him through Love itself. Love is essentially self-communicative. Those who do not have It catch It from those who have It. True love is unconquerable and irresistible; and It goes on gathering power and spreading Itself, until eventually It transforms everyone whom It touches.

Character | Coercion | Force | Love | Power | Self |

Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

A great estate is a great disadvantage to those who do not know hot to use it, for nothing is more common than to see wealthy persons live scandalously and miserably; riches do them no service in order to virtue and happiness; it is precept and principle, not an estate, that makes a man good for something.

Character | Good | Man | Nothing | Order | Precept | Riches | Service | Virtue | Virtue | Riches |

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, born Ferdinand Lewis "Lew" Alcinder, Jr.

The reason we’re here is to exercise personal responsibility, to evolve the higher self and to influence that development in others.

Character | Influence | Reason | Responsibility | Self |

Winthrop Williams Aldrich

The price of power is responsibility for the public good.

Character | Good | Power | Price | Public | Responsibility | Wisdom |

Joseph von Auffenberg

He that does not respect confidence will never find happiness in his path. The belief in virtue vanishes from his heart; the source of nobler actions becomes extinct in him.

Belief | Character | Confidence | Heart | Respect | Virtue | Virtue | Will | Wisdom | Respect | Happiness |

William Arthur

The regeneration of a sinner is an evidence of power in the highest sphere - moral nature; with the highest prerogative - to change nature; and operating to the highest result - not to create originally, which is great; but to create anew, which is greater.

Change | Character | Evidence | Nature | Power |

Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

Be simple and modest in your deportment, and treat with indifference whatever lies between virtue and vice.

Character | Indifference | Virtue | Virtue |

Thomas Adams

He who reforms himself, has done much toward reforming others; and one reason why the world is not reformed, is, because each would have others make a beginning, and never thinks of himself doing it.

Beginning | Character | Reason | World |

Arthur Aughey

There are many seasons in a man’s life - and the more exalted and responsible his position, the more frequently do these seasons recur - when the voice of duty and the dictates of feeling are opposed to each other; and it is only the weak and the wicked who yield that obedience to the selfish impulses of the heart which is due to reason and honor.

Character | Duty | Heart | Honor | Life | Life | Man | Obedience | Position | Reason |

Simeon ben Azai, sometimes Ben Azai

The recompense of virtue is virtue, and sin, sin.

Character | Recompense | Sin | Virtue | Virtue |