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

John Milton

Dim sadness did not spare that time celestial visages; yet mixed with pity, violated not their bliss.

Pity | Sadness | Time |

Martin Seligman, Martin E. P. "Marty" Seligman

When we are happy, we are less self-focused, we like others more, and we want to share our good fortune even with strangers. When we are down, though, we become distrustful, turn inward, and focus defensively on our own needs. Looking out for Number One is more characteristic of sadness than of well-being.

Focus | Fortune | Good | Happy | Sadness | Self |

Solomon, fully King Solomon, aka Jedidiah NULL

There is no wealth greater than the health of the body, there is no joy greater than the joy of the heart... A cheerful heart causes man's life to blossom, while the spirit of sadness dries the bones. Never rejoice at other people's misfortunes, for you cannot know when adversity may come to you.

Adversity | Body | Health | Heart | Joy | Life | Life | Man | People | Sadness | Spirit | Wealth |

Baal Shem Tov, given name Yisroel ben Eliezer

The Almighty has sent you into this world on an appointed errand. It is His will that you accomplish your errand in a state of joy. Sadness implies an unwillingness on your part to carry out the Almighty’s will.

Joy | Sadness | Will | World |

Francis Bacon

As for the passions and studies of the mind: avoid envy; anxious fears; anger fretting inwards; subtle and knotty inquisitions; joys and exhilarations in excess; sadness not communicated. Entertain hopes; mirth rather than joy; variety of delights, rather than surfeit of them; wonder and admiration, and therefore novelties; studies that fill the mind with splendid and illustrious objects, as histories, fables, and contemplations of nature.

Anger | Mind | Mirth | Sadness | Wonder |

I Ching, Book of Changes or Zhouyi NULL

Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return. Such recurrences should not constitute occasions for sadness but realities for awareness, so that one may be happy in the interim.

Evil | Happy | Men | Peace | Sadness |

Hugh Black

If happiness is a state of the inward life, we have to look for its chief obstructions not in outward conditions but in deeper places. Happiness depends in the last issue, as we saw, on the essential view of life. It is not a matter of distractions, nor even of mere pleasurable sensations. There may be an appearance of great prosperity with incurable sadness hidden at the heart, as there is an outward peace which is only a well-masked despair. The way to happiness is indeed harder than the way to success; for its chief enemies entrench themselves within the soul.

Appearance | Peace | Prosperity | Sadness | Happiness |

Henry Van Dyke, fully Henry Jackson Van Dyke

Half of the secular unrest and dismal, profane sadness of modern society comes from the vain ideas that every man is bound to be a critic for life.

Critic | Ideas | Man | Sadness | Society | Society |

Osho, born Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Acharya Rajneesh and Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh NULL

Anger is active sadness; sadness is inactive anger. They are not two things.

Sadness |

Jim Rohn

The walls we build around us to keep sadness out also keeps out the joy.

Sadness |

Jonathan Kozol

I always want to tell these young idealists that the world is not as dangerous as many in the older generation want them to believe...The [people] for whom I feel the greatest sadness are the ones who choke on their beliefs, who never act on their ideals, who never know the state of struggle in a decent cause, and never know the thrill of even partial victories.

Sadness | Struggle | World |

Jules de Goncourt, fully Jules Huot de Goncourt

The reason for the sadness of this modern age and the men who live in it is that it looks for the truth in everything and finds it.

Age | Looks | Men | Reason | Sadness | Truth |

Marguerite Duras, formally Marguerite Donnadieu

That she had so completely recovered her sanity was a source of sadness to her. One should never be cured of one's passion.

Sadness | Sanity |

Max Lerner, fully Maxwell "Max" Alan Lerner, aka Mikhail Lerner

The real sadness of fifty is not that you change so much but that you change so little.

Change | Sadness |

Pablo Neruda, pen name for Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto

Someone will ask later, sometimes searching for a name, his own or someone's else's why I neglected his sadness or his love... But I didn't have enough time or ink for everyone. Or maybe it was the strain of the city, of time the cold heart of the clocks.

Enough | Heart | Sadness | Time | Will |

Paulo Coelho

When you choose your attitude toward life, you can affect reality by making it better for you… When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too… Words are life set down on paper… Words are tears that have been written down. Tears are words that need to be shed. Without them, joy loses all its brilliance and sadness has no end… You can't avoid pain, but you can choose to overcome it… You are what you believe yourself to be… You are your own best friend. Never ever, put yourself down.

Better | Joy | Life | Life | Need | Reality | Sadness | Tears | Words |

Paulo Coelho

Really important meetings are planned by the souls long before the bodies see each other… Remember: when someone leaves, it's because someone else is about to arrive… Sadness does not last forever when we walk in the direction of that which we always desired… Seek to live, remembrance is for the old… Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure. You've got to find the treasure, so that everything you have learned along the way can make sense.

Heart | Important | Sadness | Will |

Pema Chödrön, born Deirdre Blomfield-Brown

Sometimes the completely open heart and mind of bhodichitta is called the soft spot, a place as vulnerable and tender as an open wound. It is equated, in part, with our ability to love… Sometimes this broken heart gives birth to anxiety and panic, sometimes to anger, resentment, and blame. But under the hardness of that armor there is the tenderness of genuine sadness. This is our link with all those who have ever loved. This genuine heart of sadness can teach us great compassion. It can humble us when we're arrogant and soften us when we are unkind. It awakens us when we prefer to sleep and pierces through our indifference. This continual ache of the heart is a blessing that when accepted fully can be shared with all.

Ability | Anxiety | Anxiety | Birth | Heart | Mind | Sadness | Teach | Tenderness |

Pema Chödrön, born Deirdre Blomfield-Brown

An analogy for bodhichitta is the rawness of a broken heart. Sometimes this broken heart gives birth to anxiety and panic, sometimes to anger, resentment, and blame. But under the hardness of that armor there is the tenderness of genuine sadness. This is our link with all those who have ever loved. This genuine heart of sadness can teach us great compassion. It can humble us when we’re arrogant and soften us when we are unkind. It awakens us when we prefer to sleep and pierces through our indifference. This continual ache of the heart is a blessing that when accepted fully can be shared with all.

Anxiety | Anxiety | Birth | Heart | Sadness | Teach | Tenderness |

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return. Such recurrences should not constitute occasions for sadness but realities for awareness, so that one may be happy in the interim.

Evil | Happy | Men | Peace | Sadness |