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

W. H. Auden, fully Wystan Hugh Auden

It is a sad fact about our culture that a poet can earn much more money writing or talking about his art than he can by practicing it.

Art | Character | Culture | Money | Talking | Writing | Art |

Johann Gottfried Seume

Idleness is the stupidity of the body, and stupidity is the idleness of the mind.

Body | Character | Idleness | Mind | Stupidity |

Jean de La Bruyère

There are only two ways of getting on in the world: by one's own industry, or by the stupidity of others.

Industry | Stupidity | Wisdom | World |

Edna Ferber

Life cannot defeat a writer who is in love with writing - for life itself is a writer's love until death.

Death | Defeat | Life | Life | Love | Wisdom | Writing |

Horace, full name Quintus Horatius Flaccus NULL

The secret of all good writing is sound judgment.

Good | Judgment | Sound | Wisdom | Writing |

Wright Morris

When writing is good, everything is symbolic, but symbolic writing is seldom good.

Good | Wisdom | Writing |

Howard Sparks

The art of our era is not art, but technology. Today Rembrandt is painting automobiles; Shakespeare is writing research reports.

Art | Era | Research | Technology | Wisdom | Writing | Art |

E. B. White, fully Elwyn Brooks White

I have yet to see a piece of writing, political or non-political, that doesn’t have a slant. All writing slants the way a writer leans, and no man is born upright. The beauty of the American free press is that the slants and the twists and the distortions come from so many directions, and the special interests are so numerous, the reader must sift and sort and check and countercheck in order to find out what the score is.

Beauty | Free press | Man | Order | Wisdom | Writing | Beauty |

Konrad Adenauer, fully Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer

The good Lord set definite limits on man's wisdom, but set no limits on his stupidity and that's just not fair.

Good | Lord | Man | Stupidity | Wisdom |

Albert Einstein

Only two things are infinite the universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the former.

Stupidity | Universe |

Mahatma Gandhi, fully Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, aka Bapu

At the time of writing I never think of what I have said before. My aim is not to be consistent with my previous statements on a given question, but to be consistent with truth as it may present itself to me [at that] given moment. The result is that I have grown from truth to truth.

Present | Question | Time | Truth | Writing | Think |

Gustave Flaubert

To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.

Good | Health | Stupidity |

Allan J Hamilton

Assign someone to be your guardian angel. Give someone in your family, a member who’s smart and attentive, the assignment of writing down and recording everything that’s don’t to and for you… the largest number of adverse events, by far, is caused by medication errors.

Events | Family | Writing |

Llewelyn Powys

It is the stupidity of our minds that prevents us from seeng existence as a mystery wilder than the dreams of Devil or God.

Devil | Dreams | Existence | God | Mystery | Stupidity |

Delmore Schwartz

Major writing is to say what has been seen, so that it need never be said again.

Need | Writing |