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

George S. Merriam

The passion for truth has underlying it a profound conviction that what is real is best; that when we get to the heart of things we shall find there what we most need.

Character | Heart | Need | Passion | Truth |

Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

There is no passion that so much transports men from their right judgments as anger. No one would demur upon punishing a judge with death who should condemn a criminal upon the account of his own choler; why then should fathers and pedants be any more allowed to whip and chastise children in their anger? It is then no longer correction but revenge. Chastisement is instead of physic to children; an should we suffer a physician who should be animated against and enraged at his patient?

Anger | Character | Children | Death | Men | Passion | Revenge | Right |

Tom Morris, fully Thomas V. "Tom" Morris

We are here to attempt to give more to this life than we take from it, a task that, if undertaken properly, is impossible. The more we give, the more we get. But that’s the point. We are here to discover, develop and cultivate, in loving stewardship of our world, our neighbors and ourselves. Each of us is intended to grow and flourish within the power of our talents on every dimension of worldly existence: the Intellectual, the Aesthetic and the Moral - the great I Am - in such a way as to find our place in the overarching realm of the Spiritual, the ultimate context of it all. There is more to life than meets the eye. Much is required. But more is offered. We are participants in a grand enterprise, not called upon to consume with endless desire, but rather to care and create in such a way as to free the spirit of this vast creation to love and glorify its creator forever. Why? Because it is good. And that’s good enough for me.

Aesthetic | Care | Character | Desire | Enough | Existence | Good | Life | Life | Love | Power | Spirit | Stewardship | World |

Robert M. Pirsig

Programmes of a political nature are important and products of social quality that can be effective only if the underlying structure of social values is right. The social values are right only if the individual values are right. The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands, and then work outside from there.

Character | Heart | Important | Individual | Nature | Right | Work | World |

Henry Ross Perot

Each of us was placed here for a special purpose. I believe that it is each person’s responsibility to determine what he or she can do to make the world a better place - and then go out and do it... Take full responsibility for our actions. Risk failure.

Better | Character | Failure | Purpose | Purpose | Responsibility | Risk | World |

Pliny the Elder, full name Casus Plinius Secundus NULL

We ought to be guarded against every appearance of envy, as a passion that always implies inferiority wherever it resides.

Appearance | Character | Envy | Inferiority | Passion |

Francis Osborn

Let your wit rather serve you for a buckler to defend yourself, by a handsome reply, than the sword to wound others, though with ever so facetious reproach; remembering that a word cuts deeper than a sharper weapon and the wound it makes is longer curing.

Character | Wisdom | Wit |

Alexander Pope

The ruling passion, be it what it will, the ruling passion conquers reason still.

Character | Passion | Reason | Will |

Alexander Pope

Strength of mind is Exercise, not Rest: The rising tempest puts in act the soul, parts it may ravage, but preserves the whole. On life’s vast ocean diversely we sail. Reason the card, but Passion is the gale... The Mind’s disease, its ruling Passion came.

Character | Disease | Life | Life | Mind | Passion | Reason | Rest | Soul | Strength |

Kathleen Norris

Home ought to be our clearinghouse, the place from which we go forth lessoned and disciplined, and ready for life.

Character | Life | Life |

Alexander Pope

The ruling passion conquers reason still.

Character | Passion | Reason |

Tatjana Patitz

I believe that being true to the self is the most important thing in life - to have a free heart, a pure soul and a pure mind. We all live, or should live, for the fulfillment of the self. We are all mirror images of each other; whatever we feel in ourselves we feel in others. I believe that we create our own lives... Intuition should play the main role in everything we do. Through the creative source of the mind and the unlimited power of the spirit all our deepest wishes come true. For me the meaning is that we are all one, and the only true reality is the spirit. Believing in the power of spirit is simply to have a passion for life, to learn, to grow, to evolve and most of all to love, and live each day and each moment of the day to the fullest.

Character | Day | Fulfillment | Heart | Important | Intuition | Life | Life | Love | Meaning | Mind | Passion | Play | Power | Reality | Self | Soul | Spirit | Wishes |

Francis Quarles

Happy is he the place of whose affection is founded upon virtue, walled with riches, glazed with beauty, and roofed with honour.

Beauty | Character | Happy | Riches | Virtue | Virtue |

Nicholas Rescher

Reason itself... demands that we recognize the limited place of the virtues of cognition, inquiry, and the cerebral side of life. An adequate account of rationality must rightly stress its importance and primacy while recognizing that the intellectual virtues are only limited components of the good life.

Character | Good | Inquiry | Life | Life | Rationality | Reason |

Nicolas Rowe

Rage is the shortest passion of our souls.

Character | Passion | Rage |

Elizabeth Sara Sheppard

To feel, to feel exquisitely, is the lot of every man; it is the charm that lends a superstitious joy to fear. But to appreciate belongs to the few; to one or two alone, here and there, the blended passion and understanding that constitute in its essence worship.

Character | Fear | Joy | Man | Passion | Understanding | Worship |