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

Emily Brontë, fully Emily Jane Brontë, aka pseudonym Ellis Bell

Kiss me again, but don't let me see your eyes! I forgive what you have done to me. I love my murderer--but yours! How can I?

Magic | Power |

Emma Goldman

But what about human nature? Can it be changed? And if not, will it endure under Anarchism? Poor human nature, what horrible crimes have been committed in thy name! Every fool, from king to policeman, from the flatheaded parson to the visionless dabbler in science, presumes to speak authoritatively of human nature. The greater the mental charlatan, the more definite his insistence on the wickedness and weaknesses of human nature. Yet, how can anyone speak of it today, with every soul in a prison, with every heart fettered, wounded, and maimed? John Burroughs has stated that experimental study of animals in captivity is absolutely useless. Their character, their habits, their appetites undergo a complete transformation when torn from their soil in field and forest. With human nature caged in a narrow space, whipped daily into submission, how can we speak of its potentialities? Freedom, expansion, opportunity, and, above all, peace and repose, alone can teach us the real dominant factors of human nature and all its wonderful possibilities. Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations. This is not a wild fancy or an aberration of the mind. It is the conclusion arrived at by hosts of intellectual men and women the world over; a conclusion resulting from the close and studious observation of the tendencies of modern society: individual liberty and economic equality, the twin forces for the birth of what is fine and true in man.

Atheism | Belief | Earth | Fighting | God | Individual | Influence | Man | Power | Rule | Servitude | Thought | God | Thought |

Emma Goldman

Man has bought brains, but all the millions in the world have failed to buy love. Man has subdued bodies, but all the power on earth has been unable to subdue love. Man has conquered whole nations, but all his armies could not conquer love. Man has chained and fettered the spirit, but he has been utterly helpless before love. Thus love has the magic power to make of a beggar a king.

Earth | Force | Gold | Life | Life | Little | Love | Magic | Man | Power | World |

Emily Brontë, fully Emily Jane Brontë, aka pseudonym Ellis Bell

Perhaps your envy counseled her Heathcliff to rob me of my treasures? But I've most of them written on my brain and printed in my heart, and you cannot deprive me of those.

Power |

Emma Goldman

Give us what belongs to us in peace, and if you don't give it to us in peace, we will take it by force.

Earth | Freedom | Gold | Life | Life | Love | Magic | Man | Power | World |

Emily Brontë, fully Emily Jane Brontë, aka pseudonym Ellis Bell

Yes,' said Catherine, stroking his long soft hair, 'if I could only get papa's consent, I'd spend half my time with you - Pretty Linton! I wish you were my brother.'

Alms | Power |

Emma Goldman

The people are urged to be patriotic ... by sacrificing their own children. Patriotism requires allegience to the flag, which means obedience and readiness to kill father, mother, brother, sister.

Appetite | Means | Power | Property | Wealth |

Emmet Fox

Never resent jealousy, it is the heights of flattery - no one is ever jealous of a fool.

Chance | Courtesy | Enemy | Error | Evil | Fighting | Harmony | Heart | Knowing | Men | Nothing | Power | Rest | Sense | Thought | Time | Truth | Old | Think | Thought |

Emmanuel Lévinas , originally Emanuelis Lévinas

The sentence in which God comes to be involved in words is not ‘I believe in God’… It is the ‘here I am’ said to the neighbor to whom I am given over, and in which I announce peace, that is, my responsibility for the other.

Nature | Power | Qualities | Sacred |

Emmet Fox

Many people look upon change with dread and foreboding. But for those on the spiritual path—for those who believe in God and the power of prayer—change is a fuller expression of life. When a problem or condition arises in your life that indicates a change, rely upon God, and realize that it is not so much that a door has closed on a chapter of your life, but rather that a door has opened on new and more interesting things.

Freedom | Law | Life | Life | Past | Position | Power | Prosperity | Rights |

Emmet Fox

Minutes spent in praying for wisdom will save hours spent in overtaking your mistakes.

Change | Dread | God | Life | Life | People | Power | God |

Emmet Fox

The first thing that we have to realize is a fact of fundamental importance, because it means breaking away from all the ordinary prepossessions of orthodoxy. The plain fact is that Jesus taught no theology whatever. His teaching is entirely spiritual or metaphysical. Historical Christianity, unfortunately, has largely concerned itself with theological and doctrinal questions which, strange to say, have no part whatever in the Gospel teaching. It will startle many good people to learn that all the doctrines and theologies of the churches are human inventions built up by their authors out of their own mentalities… There is absolutely no system of theology of doctrine to be found in the Bible; it simply is not there.

Ability | Birth | Care | Consciousness | Debt | Determination | Discovery | Life | Life | Power | Time | Will | Wisdom | Discovery | Child |

Emmet Fox

Why not make the following experiment, which will not only be thrillingly interesting, but will certainly teach you more in one day than you could learn from books or lectures in many weeks. Here is what you have to do: For one whole day think, speak, and act exactly as you would if you were absolutely convinced of the truth of the statements that God has all power and infinite intelligence, and that His nature is infinite goodness and love. To think in this manner all day will be the most difficult thing, because it is so subtle. To speak in accordance with these truths will be easier, if you are vigilant. To act in accordance with them will be the easiest part, although it may require much in the way of moral courage.

Age | Belief | Enough | God | Power | Prayer | Reason | Space | Thinking | Time | Will | God |

Emmet Fox

Claim your divine, glorious selfhood. Think it, talk it, live it and it will demonstrate itself in your life.

Bible | Energy | God | Meaning | Need | People | Power | Rest | Right | Will | God | Bible |

Emmet Fox

You are not happy because you are well. You are well because you are happy. You are not depressed because trouble has come to you, but trouble has come to you because you are depressed. You can change your thoughts and feelings, and then the outer things will come to correspond, and indeed there is no other way of working.

Books | Day | God | Nature | Power | Teach | Truth | Will | Following | God | Learn | Think | Truths |

English Proverbs

Accidents will happen (in the best-regulated families).

Power |

Emmet Fox

But where, it will naturally be asked, is this wonderful, mystic Power to be contacted? Where may we find it? And how is it brought into action? The answer is perfectly simple – This Power is to be found within your own consciousness, the last place that most people would look for it. Right within your own mentality there lies a source of energy stronger than electricity, more potent than high explosive; unlimited and inexhaustible. You only need to make conscious contact with this Power to set it working in your affairs; and all the marvelous results enumerated can be yours. This is the real meaning of such sayings in the Bible as "The Kingdom of God is within you"; and "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and all the rest shall be added."

Power | Will |

Emmet Fox

You should never "put up" with anything. You should never be willing to accept less than Health, Harmony, and Happiness. These things are your Divine Right as the sons and daughters of God, and it is only a bad habit, unconscious, as a rule, that causes you to be satisfied with less. In the depths of his being man always feels intuitively that there is a way out of his difficulties if only he can find it, and his natural instincts all point in the same direction.

God | Object | Power | Purpose | Purpose | Selfishness | Will | Worship | God |

Emmet Fox

Refuse to tolerate anything less than harmony. You can have prosperity no matter what your present circumstances may be. You can have health and physical fitness. You can have a happy and joyous life. You can have a good home of your own. You can have congenial friends and comrades. You can have a full, free, joyous life, independent and untrammeled. You can become your own master or your own mistress. But to do this you must definitely seize the rudder of your own destiny and steer boldly and firmly for the port that you intend to make.

Ability | Absolute | Acquaintance | Action | Attention | Delay | Difficulty | Faith | God | Harmony | Man | Means | Mind | Need | Peace | Power | Prayer | Quiet | Struggle | Time | Truth | Will | Trial | God | Child | Think |

Emmet Fox

Treat the "Because" when you find yourself thinking that your Prayer cannot be answered for any reason whatever - treat that reason. When something says to you that you cannot demonstrate "because" - treat the because. When you think, I cannot demonstrate because I have not enough understanding - treat for understanding. When you think, I cannot treat because I have a Headache - treat the headache. When you think, I cannot demonstrate because I am full of doubts - treat the doubts. When you think I cannot demonstrate because it is now too late - treat against the time illusion. When you think, I cannot demonstrate in this part of the country - treat against the space illusion. When you think, I cannot demonstrate this thing because of my age - treat your age belief. When you think, I cannot demonstrate because someone else will hinder me - treat the belief in a power other than God. No matter what name the because may give itself, it is still your belief in limitation. Be loyal to God and know that He and He alone has all power. Treat the because.

Freedom | Ideas | Important | Knowledge | Life | Life | Means | Need | Power | Present | Prosperity | Right | Soul | Teach | Work | Friends |