Great Throughts Treasury

"The first lesson of history is that evil is good."

"The first act in which the state really comes forward as the representative of society as a whole - the taking possession of the means of production in the name of society - is at the same time its last independent act as a state. The interference of the state power in social relations becomes superfluous in one sphere after another, and then ceases of itself. The government of persons is replaced by the admission of things and the direction of the processes of production. The state is not “abolished,” it withers away."

"The first wealth is health. Sickness is poor-spirited, and cannot serve any one; it must husband its resources to live. But health answers its own ends, and has to spare; runs over, and inundates the neighborhoods and creeks of other men's necessities."

"The first wealth is health. Sickness is poor-spirited, and cannot serve any one; it must husband its resources to live."

"The gates of thought, - how slow and late they discover themselves! Yet when they appear, we see that they were always there, always open."

"The glory of Friendship is not the outstretched hand, nor the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to ne when he discovers that someone else believes in him and is willing to trust him with his friendship."

"The god of victory is said to be one-handed, but peace gives victory to both sides."

"The greatest and supreme and the most comprehensive community is that which is composed of men and God, and that from God have descended the seeds not only to my father and grandfather, but to all beings which are generated on the earth and are produced... why should not such a man call himself a citizen of the world?"

"The greatest homage we can pay truth is to use it."

"The highest compact we can make with our fellow is - "Let there be truth between us two forevermore.""

"The greatest meliorator of the world is selfish, huckstering trade."

"The idiot, the Indian, the child, and the unschooled farmer's boy stand nearer to the light by which nature is to be read, than the dissector or the antiquary."

"The judge weighs the arguments and puts a brave face on the matter, and since there must be a decision, decides as he can, and hopes he has done justice and given satisfaction to the community."

"The key to every man is his thought. Sturdy and defying though he look, he has a helm which he obeys, which is the idea after which all his facts are classified. He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which commands his own."

"The imagination and the senses cannot be gratified at the same time."

"The imbecility of men is always inviting the impudence of power."

"The key to every man is his thought. Sturdy and defying though he look, he seldom has a helm which he obeys, which is the idea after which all his facts are classified. He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which commands his own."

"The less government we have the better - the fewer laws and less confided power."

"The less government we have the better - the fewer laws, and the less confided power. The antidote to this abuse of formal government is the influence of private character, the growth of the Individual; the appearance of the principal to supersede the proxy; the appearance of the wise man; of whom the existing government is, it must be owned, but a shabby imitation."

"The lesson of life is to believe what the years and centuries say against the hours."

"The line between failure and success is so fine that we scarcely know when we pass it - so fine that we often are on the line and do not know it."

"The life of man is the true romance, which when it is valiantly conduced, will yield the imagination a higher joy than any fiction."

"The man who can make hard things easy is the educator."

"The measure of a master is his success in bringing all men around to his opinion twenty years later."

"The next thing to saying a good thing yourself, is to quote one."

"The love is made happier by his love than the object of his affection."

"The most fugitive word or deed, the more air of doing a thing, the intimated purpose, expresses character, and the remote results of character are civil history and events that shake or settle the world. If you act, you show character; if you sit still, you show it; if you sleep, you show it."

"The only sin which we never forgive in each other is difference of opinion."

"The music that can deepest reach, cure all ill, is conceal speech."

"The only thing grief has taught me is how shallow it is."

"The only gift is a portion of thyself. Therefore the poet brings his poem; the shepherd, his lamb; the farmer, corn; the miner, a gem; the sailor, coral and shells; the painter, his picture; the girl, a handkerchief of her own sewing."

"The peril of every fine faculty is the delight of playing with it for pride. Talent is commonly developed at the expense of character, and the greater it grows, the more is the mischief. Talent is mistaken for genius, a dogma or system for truth, ambition for greatest, ingenuity for poetry, sensuality for art."

"The philosophy of waiting is sustained by all the oracles of the universe."

"The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide."

"The question is whether [suicide] is the way out, or the way in."

"The real and lasting victories are those of peace and not of war."

"The revelation of thought takes man out of servitude into freedom."

"The power of love, as the basis of a State, has never been tried."

"The pulpit and the press have many commonplaces denouncing the thirst for wealth, but if men should takes these moralists at their word, and leave off aiming to be rich, the moralists would rush to rekindle at all hazards this love or power in the people, lest civilization should be undone."

"The profit of books is according to the sensibility of the reader. The profoundest thought or passion sleeps as in a mine, until an equal mind and heart finds and publishes it."

"The poet's habit of living should be set on a key so low that the common influences should delight him."

"The reward of a thing well done is to have done it."

"The secret of education lies in respecting the pupil."

"The secret of ugliness consists not in irregularity, but in being uninteresting."

"The soul is not a compensation, but a life. The soul is. Under all this running sea of circumstance, whose waters ebb and flow with perfect balance, lies the aboriginal abyss of Being. Essence, or God, is not a relation or a part, but the whole... time and space are but inverse measures of the force of the soul."

"The soul is the perceiver and revealer or truth... We are wiser than we know."

"The secret of success in society is a certain heartiness and sympathy. A man who is not happy in company, cannot find any word in his memory that will fit the occasion; all his information is a little impertinent. A man who is happy there, finds in every turn of the conversation occasions for the introduction of what he has to say. The favorites of society are able men, and of more spirit than wit, who have no uncomfortable egotism, but who exactly fills the hour and the company, contented and contending."

"The soul of God is poured into the world through the thoughts of man."

"The soul contains the event that shall befall it, for the event is only the actualization of its thoughts; and what we pray to ourselves for is always granted."

"The sum of wisdom is that time is never lost that is devoted to work."