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

Albert Einstein

I am satisfied with the mystery of life's eternity and with a knowledge, a sense, of the marvelous structure of existence - as well as the humble attempt to understand even a tiny portion of the Reason that manifests itself in nature.

Eternity | Existence | Knowledge | Life | Life | Mystery | Nature | Reason | Sense | Understand |

Joseph Conrad

No illumination can sweep all mystery out of the world. After the departed darkness the shadows remain.

Darkness | Mystery | World |

Albert Einstein

The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.

Eternal | Mystery | World |

Walter Farrell

Perhaps some day, the modern man will learn that mystery is not the prison of the mind of man, it is his home.

Day | Man | Mind | Mystery | Prison | Will | Learn |

Edward Robert "Ted" Harrison

By equating God and the universe, we give back to the world what long ago was taken away. The world we live in, with our thoughts, passions, delights, and whatever stirs the mortal frame, must surely take on a deeper meaning. Songs are more than longitudinal sound vibrations, sunsets more than transverse electromagnetic oscillations, inspirations more than the discharge of neurons, all touched with a mystery that deepens, the more we contemplate and seek to understand.

God | Meaning | Mortal | Mystery | Sound | Universe | World | God |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

Beyond all mystery is the mercy of God.

God | Mercy | Mystery |

Simon Greenberg

One does not need to fast for days and meditate for hours at a time to experience the sense of sublime mystery which constantly envelops us. All one need do is to notice intelligently, if even for a brief moment, a blossoming tree, a forest flooded with autumn colors, an infant smiling.

Experience | Mystery | Need | Sense | Time |

Bede Griffiths, born Alan Richard Griffiths and also known as Swami Dayananda (Bliss of Compassion

There is an experience of being in pure consciousness which gives lasting peace to the soul. It is an experience of the Ground or Depth of being in the Centre of the soul, an awareness of the mystery of being beyond sense and thought, which gives a sense of fulfillment, of finality, of absolute truth.

Absolute | Awareness | Consciousness | Experience | Fulfillment | Mystery | Peace | Sense | Soul | Thought | Truth | Awareness |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

The beginning of faith is not a feeling for the mystery of living or a sense of awe, wonder, or fear. The root of religion is the question what to do with the feeling for the mystery of living, what to do with awe, wonder, or fear. Religion, the end of isolation, begins with a consciousness that something is asked of us. It is in that tense, eternal asking in which the soul is caught and in which man’s answer is elicited.

Awe | Beginning | Consciousness | Eternal | Faith | Fear | Isolation | Man | Mystery | Question | Religion | Sense | Soul | Wonder |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

The darkness of history… conceals alight. Beyond the mystery is meaning. And the meaning is destined to be disclosed.

Darkness | History | Meaning | Mystery |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

There is a built-in sense of indebtedness in the consciousness of man, an awareness of owing gratitude, of being called upon at certain moments to reciprocate, to answer, to live in a way which is compatible with the grandeur and mystery of living.

Awareness | Consciousness | Gratitude | Man | Mystery | Sense | Awareness |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

Things not only are what they are but also stand, however remotely, for something supreme. Awe is a sense for the transcendence, for the reference everywhere to mystery beyond all things. It enables us to perceive in the world intimations of the divine, to sense in small things the beginning of infinite significance, to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple; to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal.

Awe | Beginning | Eternal | Mystery | Sense | World |

Carl Jung, fully Carl Gustav Jung

Learn your theories but put them aside when you confront the mystery of the living soul.

Mystery | Soul | Theories |

Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze

To be constantly without desire is the way to have a vision of the mystery of heaven and earth, for constantly to have desire is the means by which their limitations are seen.

Desire | Earth | Heaven | Means | Mystery | Vision |

Ernest Kurtz and Katherine Ketcham

Stories reveal a spirituality that views life not as a problem to be solved, but as a mystery to be lived.

Life | Life | Mystery | Spirituality |