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

Ludwig Feuerbach, fully Ludwig Andreas von Feuerbach

I have always taken as the standard of the mode of teaching and writing, not the abstract, particular, professional philosopher, but universal man, that I have regarded man as the criterion of truth, and not this or that founder of a system, and have from the first placed the highest excellence of the philosopher in this, that he abstains, both as a man and as an author, from the ostentation of philosophy, i.e., that he is a philosopher only in reality, not formally, that he is a quiet philosopher, not a loud and still less a brawling one.

Excellence | Man | Ostentation | Quiet | Excellence |

Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

Men seek retreats for themselves, houses in the country, sea-shores, and mountains; and thou too art wont to desire such things very much. But this is altogether a mark of the most common sort of men, for it is in thy power whenever thou shalt choose to retire into thyself. For nowhere either with more quiet or more freedom from trouble does a man retire than into his own soul, particularly when he has within him such thoughts that by looking into them he is immediately in perfect tranquility; and I affirm that tranquility is nothing else than the good ordering of the mind. Constantly then give to thyself this retreat, and renew thyself; and let thy principles be brief and fundamental, which, as soon as thou shalt recur to them, will be sufficient to cleanse the soul completely, and to send thee back free from all discontent with the things to which thou returnest.

Art | Desire | Discontent | Freedom | Good | Man | Nothing | Power | Principles | Quiet | Soul | Will | Trouble | Art |

Mary Anne Radmacher

It is (often) the quiet gesture which carries the most significance - the one which suddenly directs the symphony.

Quiet |

Max Ehrmann

Ere you lie down to sleep in the night, sit still awhile, and nurse again to life your gentler self. Forget the restless, noisy spirit of the day, and encourage to speech the soft voices within you that timidly whisper of the peace of the quiet night; and occasionally look out at the quiet stars. The night will soothe you like a tender mother, folding you against her soft bosom, and hiding you from the harm of the world. Though denied and rejected by men in the light of day, the night will not reject you and in the still of her soft shadows you are free. After the day's struggle there is no freedom like unfettered thoughts, no sound like the music of silence. And though behind you lies a road of dust and heat and discouragement, and before you the challenge and uncertainty of untried paths, in this brief hour you are master of all highways, and the universe nestles in your soul.

Challenge | Freedom | Harm | Life | Life | Light | Men | Music | Peace | Quiet | Sound | Speech | Spirit | Struggle | Uncertainty | Universe | Will |

Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim

The most powerful prayer, one wellnigh omnipotent, and the worthiest work of all is the outcome of a quiet mind. The quieter it is the more powerful, the worthier, the deeper, the more telling and more perfect the prayer is. To the quiet mind all things are possible. What is a quiet mind? A quiet mind is one which nothing weighs on, nothing worries, which, free from ties and from all self-seeking, is wholly merged into the will of God and dead to its own.

God | Mind | Nothing | Prayer | Quiet | Will | Work | God |

Michelangelo, aka Michaelangelo Buonarroti, fully Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni NULL

O night, O sweetest time, though black of hue, with peace you force all the restless work to end; those who exalt you see and understand, and he is sound of mind who honours you. You cut the thread of tired thoughts, for so you offer calm in your moist shade; you send to this low sphere the dreams where we ascend up to the highest, where I long to go. Shadow of death that brings to quiet close all miseries that plague the heart and soul, for those in pain the last and best of cures; you heal the flesh of its infirmities, dry and our tears and shut away our toil, and free the good from wrath and fretting cares.

Death | Dreams | Force | Good | Heart | Mind | Pain | Peace | Quiet | Sound | Tears | Work |

Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon I

The best cure for the body is a quiet mind.

Body | Quiet |

Nathaniel Hawthorne

It is to the credit of human nature, that, except where its selfishness is brought into play, it loves more readily than it hates. Hatred, by a gradual and quiet process, will even be transformed to love, unless the change be impeded by a continually new irritation of the original feeling of hostility.

Change | Credit | Quiet | Selfishness | Will |

Pablo Neruda, pen name for Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto

I ask permission to be like everybody else, like the rest of the world and what's more, like anybody else: I beg you, with all my heart, if we are talking about me, since we are talking about me, please resist blasting the trumpet during my visit and resign yourselves to my quiet absence.

Quiet | Rest | Talking | World |

Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh

'One should forgive, under any injury,’ says the Mahabharata. It hath been said that the continuation of species is due to man’s being forgiving. Forgiveness is holiness, by forgiveness the universe is held together. Forgiveness is the might of might; forgiveness is sacrifice; forgiveness is quiet mind. Forgiveness and gentleness are the qualities of Self-possessed. They represent eternal virtue.

Eternal | Forgiveness | Gentleness | Qualities | Quiet | Universe | Forgiveness |

Paul Dirac, fully Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac

If we are honest — and scientists have to be — we must admit that religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination. It is quite understandable why primitive people, who were so much more exposed to the overpowering forces of nature than we are today, should have personified these forces in fear and trembling. But nowadays, when we understand so many natural processes, we have no need for such solutions. I can't for the life of me see how the postulate of an Almighty God helps us in any way. What I do see is that this assumption leads to such unproductive questions as why God allows so much misery and injustice, the exploitation of the poor by the rich and all the other horrors He might have prevented. If religion is still being taught, it is by no means because its ideas still convince us, but simply because some of us want to keep the lower classes quiet. Quiet people are much easier to govern than clamorous and dissatisfied ones. They are also much easier to exploit. Religion is a kind of opium that allows a nation to lull itself into wishful dreams and so forget the injustices that are being perpetrated against the people. Hence the close alliance between those two great political forces, the State and the Church. Both need the illusion that a kindly God rewards — in heaven if not on earth — all those who have not risen up against injustice, who have done their duty quietly and uncomplainingly. That is precisely why the honest assertion that God is a mere product of the human imagination is branded as the worst of all mortal sins.

Assertion | Dreams | Duty | Earth | Fear | God | Heaven | Ideas | Illusion | Imagination | Life | Life | Means | Mortal | Nature | Need | People | Quiet | Religion | God | Govern | Understand |

Paulo Coelho

If you saw a person he has left little time in life, and decided to spend the time sitting next to the bed one of them, watching a man falls asleep, they say that love is what went through, and that injured person a heart attack at this time, the necessary place of quiet just to stay near the man, he say that this love for such a great capacity for growth… If you spend too much time trying to find out what is good or bad about someone else, you'll forget your own soul and end up exhausted and defeated by the energy you have wasted in judging others.

Capacity | Energy | Good | Heart | Little | Love | Man | Quiet | Soul | Time |

Peter F. Drucker, fully Peter Ferdinand Drucker

Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.

Action | Quiet | Reflection | Will |

Albert Einstein

I lived in solitude in the country and noticed how the monotony of a quiet life stimulates the creative mind.

Life | Life | Quiet | Solitude |

Tacitus, fully Publius (or Gaius) Cornelius Tacitus NULL

In stirring up tumult and strife, the worst men can do the most, but peace and quiet cannot be established without virtue.

Men | Peace | Quiet |

Albert Einstein

The monotony and solitude of a quiet life stimulates the creative mind.

Life | Life | Quiet | Solitude |

Ralph Blum

There is a calmness to a life lived in gratitude, a quiet joy.

Calmness | Life | Life | Quiet |