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

Eugen Drewermann

The hands that we put around each other in love and the invisible hand that protects all lovers: In their grasp lies all the meaning that this life can bear.

Character | Life | Life | Love | Meaning |

Fyodor Dostoevsky, fully Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoevsky or Feodor Mikhailovich Dostoevski

The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himsefl without love he gives away his passions and coarse pleasuures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himsefl. The man wholies to himself can be more easily offended than anyone.

Character | Distinguish | Love | Lying | Man | Men | Order | Respect | Truth | Respect |

Henry Havelock Ellis

Jealousy: that dragon which slays love under the pretense of keeping it alive.

Character | Jealousy | Love |

Cyrus the Great, aka Cyrus the Elder, Cyrus II or Cyrus of Persia NULL

All men have their frailties; and whoever looks for a friend without imperfections, will never find what he seeks. We love ourselves notwithstanding our faults, and we ought to love our friends in like manner.

Character | Frailties | Friend | Looks | Love | Men | Will | Friends |

Alexandre Dumas, born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie

Pure love and suspicion cannot dwell together: at the door where the latter enters, the former makes its exit.

Character | Love | Suspicion | Wisdom |

Orville Dewey

There is nothing to do with men but to love them; to contemplate their virtues with admiration, their faults with pity and forbearance, and their injuries with forgiveness.

Admiration | Character | Forbearance | Forgiveness | Love | Men | Nothing | Pity |

Orville Dewey

How many a knot of mystery and misunderstanding would be untied by one word spoken in simple and confiding truth of heart! How many a solitary place would be made glad if love were there, and how many a dark dwelling would be filled with light!

Character | Circumstances | Existence | Future | Life | Life | Love | Mystery | Teach | Truth |

George Eliot, pen name of Mary Ann or Marian Evans

There is no sorrow I have though more about than that, to love what is great, and try to reach it, and yet to fail.

Character | Love | Sorrow |

Sara Davidson

The ability to laugh at life is right at the top, with love and communication in the hierarchy of our needs. Humor has much to do with pain; it exaggerates the anxieties and absurdities we feel, so that we gain distance and through laughter, relief.

Ability | Character | Humor | Laughter | Life | Life | Love | Pain | Right | Wisdom |

Hans Denk

God forces no one, for love cannot compel, and God’s service, therefore, is a thing of perfect freedom.

Character | Freedom | God | Love | Service |

Madame Deluzy, Luzy Dorothee

There is a vein of inconsistency in every woman’s heart, within whose portals love hath entered.

Character | Heart | Inconsistency | Love | Woman |

Charles Alexander Eastman, first named Ohiyesa

The Indians were religious from the first moments of life. From the moment of the mother’s recognition that she had conceived to the end of the child’s second year of life, which was the ordinary duration of lactation, it was supposed by us that the mother’s spiritual influence was supremely important. Her attitude and secret meditations must be such to instill into the receptive soul of the unborn child the love of the Great Mystery and a sense of connectedness with all creation. Silence and isolation are the rule of life for the expectant mother... Silence, love, reverence - this is the trinity of first lessons, and to these she later adds generosity, courage and chastity.

Character | Chastity | Courage | Generosity | Important | Influence | Isolation | Life | Life | Love | Mother | Mystery | Reverence | Rule | Sense | Silence | Soul | Child |

John Denham, fully Sir John Denham

Whatsoever is worthy of their love is worth their anger.

Anger | Character | Love | Worth |

Dubner Magid, name for Rabbi Jacob ben wolf Krantz

A person whose major goal in life is spiritual growth feels love for anyone who suggests ways he can improve.

Character | Growth | Life | Life | Love |

Charles Alexander Eastman, first named Ohiyesa

It was our belief that the love of possessions is a weakness to be overcome. Its appeal is to the material part, and if allowed its way, it will in time disturb one’s spiritual balance. Therefore, children must early learn the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving. If a child is inclined to be grasping, or to cling to any of his or her little possessions, legends are related about the contempt and disgrace falling upon the ungenerous and mean person... The Indians in their simplicity literally give away all that they have - to relatives, to guests of other tribes or clans, but above all to the poor and the aged, from whom they can hope for no return.

Balance | Beauty | Belief | Character | Children | Contempt | Disgrace | Generosity | Giving | Guests | Hope | Legends | Little | Love | Possessions | Simplicity | Taste | Time | Weakness | Will | Beauty | Child | Happiness | Learn |

Euripedes NULL

Many are the natures of men, various their manners of living, yet a straight path is always the right one; and lessons deeply taught lead man to paths of righteousness; reverence, I say, is wisdom and by its grace transfigures - so that we seek virtue with a right judgment. From all of this springs honor bringing ageless glory into Man’s life. Oh, a mighty quest is the hunting out of virtue.

Character | Glory | Grace | Honor | Judgment | Life | Life | Man | Manners | Men | Reverence | Right | Righteousness | Virtue | Virtue | Wisdom |

Charles Darwin, fully Charles Robert Darwin

To do good in return for evil, to love your enemy, is a height of morality to which it may be doubted whether the social instincts would, by themselves, have ever led us.

Character | Enemy | Evil | Good | Love | Morality |

Declaration of Independence NULL

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Character | Liberty | Life | Life | Men | Rights | Self | Truths |