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

Erich Auerbach

Just to avoid the pursuit of which is true, to avoid the inevitable pursuit of the fittest. Incapable of non-justice, without justice is tyrannical power. Justice is not necessarily opposed the strength, because there are always bad people. Justice of the non-power remains in the dock. So, we need to combine strength with justice, fair to do so strong, you need to have a justice of the fittestÂ… justice open to debate. Understood at first sight, the unquestioned power. For this reason, we could not give strength to justice, because power, go against justice, he said it was fair.

Beauty | Giving | Imitation | Poetry | Sense | Writing | Beauty |

Erma Bombeck, fully Erma Louise Bombeck, born Erma Fiste

I have a hat. It is graceful and feminine and give me a certain dignity, as if I were attending a state funeral or something. Someday I may get up enough courage to wear it, instead of carrying it.

Giving | Thought | Thought |

Ernest Becker

Mother nature is a brutal bitch, red in tooth and claw, who destroys what she creates.

Awareness | Comfort | Culture | Dedication | Evolution | Fury | Giving | Hope | Life | Life | Man | Purpose | Purpose | Society | Time | Society | Awareness | Understand |

Ernest Hemingway, fully Ernest Miller Hemingway

To hell with them. Nothing hurts if you don't let it.

Day | Giving | Problems | Time | World |

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

Both theoretical considerations and practical experience have led me to the conclusion that socialism is of interest solely for its non-economic values and the possibility it creates for the overcoming of the religion of economics.

Giving |

Erwin Rommel, fully Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel

Anyone who has to fight, even with the most modern weapons, against an enemy in complete command of the air, fights like a savage against modern European troops, under the same handicaps and with the same chances of success.

Giving | Present | Society | Society |

Ester and Jerry Hicks

Anytime you feel negative emotion, stop and say: 'Something is important here, otherwise I would not be feeling this negative emotion. What is it that I want?' And then simply turn your attention to what you DO want. In the moment that you turn your attention to what you want, the negative attraction will stop, and in the moment the negative attraction stops, the positive attraction will begin. And in that moment, your feelings will change from not feeling good to feeling good.

Absence | Attention | Giving | Will |

Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara

The university, vanguard of our struggling people, cannot become a backward element, but it would become so if the university did not incorporate itself into the great plans of the Revolution.

Giving | Society | Will | Society |

Ester and Jerry Hicks

You will know your path by the fun of it.

Attention | Cause | Giving | Harmony | Work |

Ethiopian Proverbs

Do not hesitate or you will be left in between doing something, having something and being nothing.

Blame | Giving | God | God |

Ester and Jerry Hicks

When you are thinking of money in the way that will make it come to you, you always feel good. When you are thinking of money in the way that keeps it from coming to you, you always feel bad. That is how you know the difference.

Attention | Giving |

Étienne Gilson, fully Étienne Henry Gilson

So we must try to distinguish between two questions that are often confused in this discussion. Is the existence of God a truth demonstrable by natural reason, so that it is knowable and known with certitude? Without a doubt the answer to this first question is “yes.” The second question is whether everyone can consider his natural reason infallible in its effort to demonstrate rationally the existence of God? The merciless criticism of the proofs of St. Augustine, St. Anselm, Descartes, Malebranche and many others are timely reminders of the need for modesty. Are we keener philosophers than they? That is the whole question. Modesty is not skepticism. So we should not be afraid to let our mind pursue the proof of God’s existence until we reach the greatest possible certitude, but we should keep intact our faith in the word that reveals this truth to the most simple folk as well as to the most learned. Here it is well to meditate on the very complex and nuanced passage in ST 2-2.2.4: “Is it necessary to believe what can be proved by natural reason?” The answer is in the affirmative: “We must accept by faith not only what is above reason but also what can be known by reason.”

Beginning | Body | Experience | Giving | Life | Life | Looks | Philosophy | Wisdom | Learn |

Étienne Bonnot de Condillac

These two arts associated themselves with that of gesture, their elder sister, and known by the name of Dance. From whence there is reason to conjecture, that some kind of dance, and some kind of music and poetry, might have been observed at all times, and in all nations.

Attention | Giving | Order |

Gore Vidal, fully Eugene Luther Gore Vidal

Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say and not giving a damn.

Giving | Knowing |

Gore Vidal, fully Eugene Luther Gore Vidal

The idea of a good society is something you do not need a religion and eternal punishment to buttress; you need a religion if you are terrified of death.

Giving | Government | Religion | Government |

Eustace Budgell

Those who have searched into human nature observe that nothing so much shows the nobleness of the soul, as that its felicity consists in action. Every man has such an active principle in him that he will find out something to employ himself upon, in whatever place or state of life he is posted.

Conversation | Discretion | Giving | Good | Love | Man | Nothing | Sense |

Felix Adler

It is the prerogative of man that he need not blindly follow the law of his natural being, but is himself the author of a higher moral law, and creates it even in acting it out.

Confidence | Giving | Good | Influence | Nature | Nobility | Wisdom | Wise |

Ezra Taft Benson

Humility responds to God's will-to the fear of His judgments and to the needs of those around us. To the proud, the applause of the world rings in their ears; to the humble, the applause of heaven warms their hearts. Someone has said, "Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man."

Boys | Children | Church | Desire | Family | Future | Giving | Hope | Man | Men | Mission | Prayer | Principles | Reading | Religion | Will | Old |