Great Throughts Treasury

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

Thomas Hughes

English Author, known best for "Tom Brown's School Days"

"The conscience of every man recognizes courage as the foundation of manliness, and manliness as the perfection of human character."

"Blessed are they who have the gift of making friends, for it is one of God's best gifts. It involves many things, but above all, the power of going out of one's self and appreciating whatever is noble and loving in another."

"He went down to the school with a glimmering of another lesson in his heart - the lesson that he who has conquered his own coward spirit has conquered the whole outward world."

"If we look abroad upon the great multitude of mankind, and endeavor to trace out the principles of action in every individual, it will, I think, seem highly probably that ambition runs through the whole species, and that every man, in proportion to the vigor of his complexion, is more or less actuated by it."

"When shall we learn that he who multiplieth possessions, multiplieth troubles, and that the one single use of things which we call our own, is that they may be his who hath need of them?"

"A divine ought to calculate his sermons as an astrologer does his almanac--to the meridian of the place and people where he lives."

"A fop who admires his person in a glass soon enters into a resolution of making his fortune by it, not questioning that every woman who falls in his way will do him as much justice as himself."

"Be ever engaged, so that whenever the devil calls he may find you occupied."

"From behind the shadow of the still small voice--more awful than tempest or earthquake--more sure and persistent than day and night--is always sounding full of hope and strength to the weariest of us all, Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

"Gaming finds a man a cully, and leaves him a knave."

"He never wants anything but what's right and fair; only when you come to settle what's right and fair, it's everything that he wants and nothing that you want. Thomas Hughes Fav"

"It may be remarked for the comfort of honest poverty that avarice reigns most in those who have but few good qualities to recommend them. This is a weed that will grow in a barren soil."

"Life isn't all beer and skittles, but beer and skittles, or something better of the same sort, must form a good part of every Englishman's education."

"Mere bashfulness without merit is awkward."

"No woman can be handsome by the force of features alone, any more than she can be witty only by the help of speech."

"Establishing friendships include many capabilities, especially for unselfish and to appreciate the greatness of the soul as well as the attractiveness of others."

"One's own—what a charm there is in the words! how long it takes boy and man to find out their worth! how fast most of us hold on to them! faster and more jealously, the nearer we are to the general home into which we can take nothing, but must go naked as we came into the world. When shall we learn that he who multiplieth possessions, multiplieth troubles, and that the one single use of things which we call our own, is that they may be his who hath need of them?"

"Plays and romances sell as well as books of devotion, but with this difference,--more people read the former than buy them, and more buy the latter than read them."

"Remember there's always a voice saying the right thing to you somewhere if you'll only listen for it"

"So bear in mind that majorities, especially respectable ones, are nine times out of ten in the wrong; and that if you see man or boy striving earnestly on the weak side, however wrong-headed or blundering he may be, you are not to go and join the cry against him. If you can't join him and help him, and make him wiser, at any rate remember that he has found something in the world which he will fight and suffer for."

"Stolen kisses are always sweeter."

"The Browns have become illustrious by the pen of Thackeray and the pencil of Doyle, within the memory of the young gentlemen who are now matriculating at the Universities."

"The only instance of a despairing sinner left upon record in the New Testament is that of a treacherous and greedy Judas} Covetousness, like jealousy, when it has ones taken root, never leaves a man but with his life."

"The surest way of governing, both in a private family and a kingdom, is for a husband and a prince sometimes to drop their prerogative."

"There isn’t such a reasonable fellow in the world, to hear him talk. He Tom Brown never wants anything but what’s right and fair; only when you come to settle what’s right and fair, its everything he wants, and nothing that you want. And that’s his idea of a compromise."

"To be read by bare inscriptions, like many in Gruter,--to hope for eternity by enigmatical epithets or first letters of our names--to be studied by antiquarians who we were, and have new names given us like many of the mummies, are cold consolation unto the students of perpetuity, even by everlasting languages."

"To hear is to heed."

"To-morrow cheats us all. Why dost thou stay, and leave undone what should be done to-day? Begin--the present minute's in thy power; but still t' adjourn, and wait a fitter hour, is like the clown, who at some river's side expecting stands, in hopes the running tide will all ere long be past.-- Fool! not to know it still has flow'd the same, and will forever flow."

"War with vices, but peace with individuals."

"We all have to learn, in one way or another, that neither men nor boys get second chances in this world. We all get new chances to the end of our lives, but not second chances in the same set of circumstances; and the great difference between one person and another is how he takes hold and uses his first chance, and how he takes his fall if it is scored against him."

"What is got over the devil's back is spent under his belly."

"When a man makes up his mind to thrash another, he must also make up his mind to be a little thrashed himself."