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

George Matthew Adams

It is indifference which is the cause of most of our unhappiness. Indifference to religion, to the happiness of others, and to the precious gift of freedom, and the wide liberty that is the inheritance of all in a free land. Are we our "Brother's Keeper"? We certainly are! If we had no regard for others' feelings or fortune, we would grow cold and indifferent to life itself. Bound up with selfishness, we could not hope for the success that could easily be ours.

Cause | Character | Feelings | Fortune | Freedom | Hope | Indifference | Inheritance | Land | Liberty | Life | Life | Regard | Religion | Selfishness | Success | Unhappiness | Happiness |

John Armstrong

Virtue, the strength and beauty of the soul, is the best gift of heaven; a happiness that, even above the smiles and frowns of fate, exalts great Nature’s favorites; a wealth that ne’er encumbers, nor can be transferr’d.

Beauty | Character | Fate | Heaven | Nature | Soul | Strength | Virtue | Virtue | Wealth | Beauty | Happiness |

Yehuda Leib Chasman

Your awareness of your self-worth is not a contradiction to the obligation to be humble. Humility is not a lack of awareness of your positive accomplishments and abilities. Only a fool is not aware of what he really is an this is not humility. Humility is the internalized awareness with every fiber of your body that everything, yes everything, you have is not your own. Rather it is a gift from the Almighty who bestowed His kindness on you. The more a person actually feels that what he has is a gift the greater is his humility.

Awareness | Body | Character | Contradiction | Humility | Kindness | Obligation | Self | Self-worth | Worth | Awareness |

Susan Fenimore Cooper, fully Susan Augusta Fenimore Cooper

What a noble gift to man are the forests! What a debt of gratitude and admiration we owe to their beauty and their utility! How pleasantly the shadows of the wood fall upon our heads when we turn from the glitter and turmoil of the world of man!

Admiration | Beauty | Character | Debt | Gratitude | Man | Turmoil | Wisdom | World | Beauty |

Irwin Edman

The gift of gaiety may itself be the greatest good fortune, and the most serious step toward maturity.

Character | Fortune | Good |

Thomas Hobbes

Belief and unbelief never follow men’s commands. Faith is a gift from God which man can neither give nor take away by promise of rewards or menaces of torture.

Belief | Character | Faith | God | Man | Men | Promise | Torture | Unbelief | God |

Julius Charles Hare (1795-1855) and his brother Augustus William Hare

Right is might, and ever was, and ever shall be so. Holiness, meekness, patience, humility, self-denial, and self-sacrifice, faith, love, each is might and every gift of the spirit is might.

Character | Faith | Humility | Love | Meekness | Patience | Right | Sacrifice | Self | Self-denial | Self-sacrifice | Spirit |

Carl Holmes

A happy life is made up of little things in which smiles and small favors are given habitually. A gift sent, a letter written, a call made, a recommendation given, transportation provided, a cake made, a book lent, a check sent - things which are done without hesitation. Kindness isn't sacrifice so much as it is being considerate for the feelings of others, sharing happiness, the unselfish thought, the spontaneous and friendly act, forgetfulness of our own present interests.

Character | Feelings | Forgetfulness | Happy | Kindness | Life | Life | Little | Present | Sacrifice | Thought |

Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL

If you love knowledge, you will be a master of knowledge. What you have come to know, pursue by exercise; what you have not learned, seek to add to your knowledge, for it is as reprehensible to hear a profitable saying and not grasp it as to be offered a good gift by one's friends and not accept it. Believe that many precepts are better than much wealth , for wealth quickly fails us, but precepts abide through all time.

Better | Character | Good | Knowledge | Love | Time | Wealth | Will | Friends |

Richard and Mary-Alice Jafolla

We all have a gift. Each of us is born with something unique to express, to do, to become. It is your responsibility to discover your unique gift... Once having been discovered, the gift is developed and nurtured and then it is given back... Real joy comes from giving back, from being authentically you and sharing that authenticity with those around you.

Authenticity | Character | Giving | Joy | Responsibility | Unique |

Maria Jane Jewsbury

Love is the purification of the heart from self; it strengthens and ennobles the character; gives higher motive and nobler aim to every action of life, and makes both man and woman strong, noble, and courageous. The power to love truly and devotedly is the nobles gift with which a human being can be endowed; but it is a sacred fire that must not be burned to idols.

Action | Character | Heart | Life | Life | Love | Man | Power | Sacred | Self | Woman |

Israel Knox

Education is not a process that continues for some years and then ends. Education has only one sovereign purpose: to prepare one for more education. All else is subsidiary to this. Education should create hungers - spiritual, moral, and aesthetic hungers for value... The gift of education will be a heart that is whole.

Aesthetic | Character | Education | Ends | Heart | Purpose | Purpose | Will |

James Russell Lowell

The only conclusive evidence of a man’s sincerity is that he gives himself for a principle. Words, money, all things else, are comparatively easy to give away; but when a man makes a gift of his daily life and practice, it is plain that the truth whatever it may be, has taken possession of him.

Character | Evidence | Life | Life | Man | Money | Practice | Sincerity | Truth | Words |

Johann Kaspar Lavater

The manner of giving shows the character of the giver more than the gift itself.

Character | Giving |

George William McDonald

Instead of a gem or a flower, cast the gift of a lovely thought into the heart of a friend.

Character | Friend | Heart | Thought | Thought |

Doris Peel

Each of us has to learn that it's no true gift to have another say: "Beside you, nobody else matters -" since the only tribute to be trusted in life is, in the end, the one that means: "Because of you, all others in some way matter more."

Character | Life | Life | Means | Learn |