Great Throughts Treasury

"The history of the race is but that of the individual "writ large"."

"The magic of the pen lies in the concentration of your thoughts upon one object."

"The moral nature of man is more sacred in my eyes than his intellectual nature. I know they cannot be divorced — that without intelligence we should be Brutes — but it is the tendency of our gaping, wondering dispositions to give pre-eminence to those faculties which most astonish us. Strength of character seldom, if ever, astonishes; goodness, lovingness, and quiet self-sacrifice, are worth all the talents in the world."

"The object of Literature is to instruct, to animate, or to amuse."

"The public can only be really moved by what is genuine."

"The real people of genius were resolute workers not idle dreamers."

"The superiority of one mind over another depends on the rapidity with which experiences are thus organized."

"The true function of philosophy is to educate us in the principles of reasoning and not to put an end to further reasoning by the introduction of fixed conclusions"

"To some men popularity is always suspicious. Enjoying none themselves, they are prone to suspect the validity of those attainments which command it."

"To write much, and to write rapidly, are empty boasts. The world desires to know what you have done, and not how you did it."

"We are not judicious in love; we do not select those whom we ought to love, but those whom we cannot help loving."

"We must never assume that which is incapable of proof."

"When a man fails to see the truth of certain generally accepted views, there is no law compelling him to provoke animosity by announcing his dissent."