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

William Blake

War is energy Enslav'd.

Energy | War | Wisdom |

Henri Bergson, aka Henri-Louis Bergson

All life, animal and vegetable, seems in its essence like an effort to accumulate energy and then to let it flow into flexible channels, changeable in shape, at the end of which it will accomplish infinitely varied kinds of work. That is what the vital impetus, passing through matter, would fain do all at once. It would succeed, no doubt, if its power were unlimited, or if some reinforcement could come to it from without. But the impetus is finite, and it has been given once for all. It cannot overcome all obstacles. The movement it starts is sometimes turned aside, sometimes divided, always opposed; and the evolution of the organized world is the unrolling of this conflict.

Doubt | Effort | Energy | Evolution | Life | Life | Power | Will | Wisdom | Work | World |

Arthur Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour, fully Arthur James Balfour, aka Lord Balfour

Destiny is the scapegoat which we make responsible for all our crimes and follies; a necessity which we set down for invincible when we have no wish to strive against it.

Destiny | Necessity | Wisdom |

J. E. Boodin

There is the laughter which is born out of the pure joy of living, the spontaneous expression of health and energy - the secret laughter of the child. This is a gift of God. There is the warm laughter of the kindly soul which heartens the discouraged, gives health to the sick and comfort to the dying... There is, above all, the laughter that comes from the eternal joy of creation, the joy of making the world new, the joy of expressing the inner riches of the soul - laughter that triumphs over pain and hardship in the passion for an enduring ideal, the joy of bringing the light of happiness, of truth and beauty into a dark world. This is divine laughter par excellence.

Beauty | Comfort | Energy | Eternal | Excellence | God | Health | Joy | Laughter | Light | Pain | Passion | Riches | Soul | Truth | Wisdom | World | Riches | Hardship | Beauty |

Thomas A. Buckner

To bring one's self to a frame of mind and to the proper energy to accomplish things that require plain hard work continuously is the one big battle that everyone has. When this battle is won for all time, then everything is easy.

Battle | Energy | Mind | Self | Time | Wisdom | Work |

Capelle NULL

Nature has made occupation a necessity to us; society makes a duty; habit may make it a pleasure.

Duty | Habit | Nature | Necessity | Occupation | Pleasure | Society | Wisdom | Society |

Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton

What is past is past. There is a future left to all men who have the virtue to repent, and the energy to atone.

Energy | Future | Men | Past | Virtue | Virtue | Wisdom |

Thomas Buxton, fully Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, 1st Baronet

The longer I live, the more I am certain that the difference between men, between the feeble and the powerful, between the great and the insignificant, is energy - invincible determination - a purpose once fixed, and then death or victory.

Death | Determination | Energy | Men | Purpose | Purpose | Wisdom |

G. K. Chesterton, fully Gilbert Keith Chesterton

We all live in the past, because there is nothing else to live in. To live in the present is like proposing to sit on a pin. It is too minute, it is too slight a support, it is too uncomfortable a posture, and it is of necessity followed immediately by totally different experiences, analogous to those of jumping up with a yell. To live in the future is a contradiction in terms. The future is dead, in the perfectly definite sense it is not alive.

Contradiction | Future | Necessity | Nothing | Past | Present | Sense | Wisdom |

Tyron Edwards

True conservatism is substantial progress; it holds fast what is true and good in order to advance in both. To cast away the old is not of necessity to attain the new. To reject anything that is valuable, lessens the power of gaining more. That a thing is new does not of course commend; that it is old does not discredit. The test question is, "Is it true or good?"

Conservatism | Good | Necessity | Order | Power | Progress | Question | Wisdom | Old |

Freeman John Dyson

There are three reasons why, quite apart from scientific considerations, mankind needs to travel in space. The first reason is garbage disposal; we need to transfer industrial processes into space so that the earth may remain a green and pleasant place for our grandchildren to live in. The second reason is to escape material impoverishment; the resources of this planet are finite, and we shall not forgo forever the abundance of solar energy and minerals and living space that are spread out all around us. The third reason is our spiritual need for an open frontier. The ultimate purpose of space travel is to bring to humanity, not only scientific discoveries and an occasional spectacular show on television, but a real expansion of our spirit.

Abundance | Earth | Energy | Humanity | Mankind | Need | Purpose | Purpose | Reason | Space | Spirit | Television | Wisdom |

Friedrich Engels

With the seizing of the means of production by society, production of commodities is done away with, and, simultaneously, the mastery of the product over the producer. Anarchy in social production is replaced by plan-conforming, conscious organization. The struggle for individual existence disappears... Only from that time will man himself, with full consciousness, make his own history - only from that time will the social causes set in movement by him have, in the main and in a constantly growing measure, the results intended by him. It is the ascent of man from the kingdom of necessity to the kingdom of freedom.

Anarchy | Consciousness | Existence | Freedom | History | Individual | Man | Means | Necessity | Organization | Plan | Society | Struggle | Time | Will | Wisdom |

Horace Fletcher, nicknamed "The Great Masticator"

Fear is an acid which is pumped into one's atmosphere. It causes mental, moral and spiritual asphyxiation, and sometimes death; death to energy and all growth.

Death | Energy | Fear | Growth | Wisdom |

Benjamin Franklin

To be thrown upon one's own resources, is to be cast into the very lap of fortune; for our faculties then undergo a development and display an energy of which they were previously unsusceptible.

Display | Energy | Fortune | Wisdom |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Law is mighty, necessity is mightier.

Law | Necessity | Wisdom |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

One should only celebrate a happy ending; celebrations at the outset exhaust the joy and energy needed to urge us forward and sustain us in the long struggle. And of all celebrations a wedding is the worst; no day should be kept more quietly and humbly.

Day | Energy | Happy | Joy | Struggle | Wisdom |

James Hadfield, fully Captain James Arthur Hadfield

This art of resting the mind and the power of dismissing from it all care and worry is probably one of the secrets of energy in our great men.

Art | Care | Energy | Men | Mind | Power | Wisdom | Worry | Art |