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

Michael Beer

Man’s freedom is his inner worth... His guilt alone can rob him of it.

Freedom | Guilt | Man | Worth |

Carol Adrienne

It is counterproductive to assume we have created every misfortune in our life, as if we had made a conscious intention to do so. That kind of thinking leads to guilt and despair. Nevertheless, a sincere willingness to acknowledge that we have certain beliefs that have created our situation will enrich our approach to working through obstacles.

Despair | Guilt | Intention | Life | Life | Misfortune | Thinking | Will | Misfortune |

Henri Frédéric Amiel

Before crime is committed, conscience must be corrupted.

Conscience | Crime |

Joe Boot

To live by the code of “do as you please regardless” is to become a prisoner of your own moral corruption. It is to be troubled by guilt and tormented by the inconsistency of living contrary to the demands of your own conscience and moral nature. You simply cannot be satisfied while ignoring any part of your nature.

Conscience | Corruption | Guilt | Inconsistency | Nature |

Norman F. Dixon

The apportioning of blame [is] the means by which society obtains a modicum of revenge for the wrong it has suffered, expiates its own guilt for such responsibility as it may have had for the event in question, and finally seeks to prevent a repetition of the disaster.

Blame | Guilt | Means | Question | Responsibility | Revenge | Society | Wrong | Society |

Leon Eisenberg

Pessimism about man serves to maintain the status quo. It is a luxury for the affluent, a sop to the guilt of the politically inactive, a comfort to those who continue to enjoy the amenities of privilege.

Comfort | Guilt | Luxury | Man | Pessimism |

Cyprian, aka Saint Cyprian of Carthage, fully Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus NULL

The world is drenched in mutual slaughter… Held to be a crime when committed by individuals, homicide is called a virtue when committed by the state.

Crime | Virtue | Virtue | World |

Charles Fillmore

It is not a crime to be rich, nor a virtue to be poor… The sin lies in hoarding wealth and keeping it from circulating freely to all who need it.

Crime | Need | Sin | Virtue | Virtue | Wealth |

J. Glenn Gray

The root of the guilt problem lies in human nature itself, in our failure as human being to live in accordance with our potentialities and our vision of the good.

Failure | Good | Guilt | Human nature | Nature | Vision | Failure |

Bede Jarrett

Its effects on the soul is to be measured neither by the guilt nor by the temporal punishment inexorably fixed, but by that deep sense of loneliness it brings with it.

Guilt | Loneliness | Punishment | Sense | Soul |

Shantideva NULL

The whole earth cannot satisfy the lust of the flesh; who can do its will? To him who longs for the impossible come guilt and bafflement of desire; but he who is utterly without desire has a happiness that ages not.

Desire | Earth | Guilt | Lust | Will | Happiness |

E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher

No degree of prosperity could justify the accumulation of large highly toxic substances which nobody knows how to make “safe” and which remain an incalculable danger to the whole of creation for historical or even geological ages. To do such a thing is a transgression against life itself, a transgression infinitely more serious than any crime ever perpetrated by man.

Crime | Danger | Justify | Life | Life | Man | Prosperity | Safe | Danger |

Seneca the Younger, aka Seneca or Lucius Annaeus Seneca NULL

We are made not only individually, but nationally. We check manslaughter and isolated murders; but what of war and the much-vaunted crime of slaughtering whole peoples?… Deeds that would be punished by loss of life when committed in secret are praised by us because uniformed generals have carried them out.

Crime | Deeds | Life | Life | War | Deeds | Loss |