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

Hugh Blair

Industry is not only the instrument of improvement, but the foundation of pleasure. He who is a stranger to it may possess, but cannot enjoy; for it is labor only which gives relish to pleasure. It is the appointed vehicle of every good to man. It is the indispensable condition of possessing a sound mind in a sound body.

Body | Character | Good | Improvement | Indispensable | Industry | Labor | Man | Mind | Pleasure | Sound |

Jean Shinoda Bolen

I had the opportunity to deliver babies... In each of these numinous moments, I knew that life had meaning; each experience was accompanied by an upwelling of gratitude and humility. These moments, which can be called an experience of the self, or archetype of meaning, are akin to the act of finally seeing the Holy Grail after a long quest... It is through these moments of grace and gratitude that we acquire a sense of meaning and a desire to live a meaningful life. The personal challenge is now.

Challenge | Character | Desire | Experience | Grace | Gratitude | Humility | Life | Life | Meaning | Opportunity | Self | Sense |

Phillips Brooks

It is better to inspire the heart with a noble sentiment than to teach the mind a truth of science.

Better | Character | Heart | Mind | Science | Sentiment | Teach | Truth |

Bhadantācariya Buddhaghoṣa

Mindfulness should be strong everywhere, for mindfulness keeps the mind away from distraction, into which it might fall, since faith, energy and understanding partake of the nature of distraction: and away from idleness, into which it might fall, since concentration partakes of the nature of idleness.

Character | Energy | Faith | Idleness | Mind | Mindfulness | Nature | Understanding |

Boethius, fully Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius NULL

The trouble of the many and various aims of mortal men bring them much care, and herein they go forward by different paths but strive to reach one end, which is happiness. And that good is that, to which if any man attain, he can desire nothing further... Happiness is a state which is made perfect by the union of all good things. This end all men seek to reach, as I said, though by different paths. For there is implanted by nature in the minds of men a desire for the true good; but error leads them astray towards false goods by wrong paths.

Aims | Care | Character | Desire | Error | Good | Man | Men | Mortal | Nature | Nothing | Wrong | Trouble | Happiness |

Jean de La Bruyère

Discretion is the perfection of reason, and a guide to us in all the duties of life; cunning is a kind of instinct, that only looks after our immediate interests and welfare. Discretion is only found in men of strong sense and good understanding; cunning is often to be met with in brutes themselves, and in persons who are but the fewest removes from them.

Character | Cunning | Discretion | Good | Instinct | Life | Life | Looks | Men | Perfection | Reason | Sense | Understanding |

Abel Bonnard

Not only is there a right to be happy, there is a duty to be happy. So much sadness exists in the world that we are all under obligation to contribute as much joy as lies within our powers.

Character | Duty | Happy | Joy | Obligation | Right | Sadness | World |

Pearl S. Buck, fully Pearl Sydenstricker Buck, also known by her Chinese name Sai Zhenzhu

The person who tries to live alone will not succeed as a human being. His heart withers if it does not answer another heart. His mind shrinks away if he hears only the echoes of his own thoughts and finds no other inspiration.

Character | Heart | Inspiration | Mind | Will | Wisdom |

Barnett Brickner

Success in marriage does not come merely through finding the right mate, but through being the right mate.

Character | Marriage | Right | Success |

Thomas Chalmers

The human mind feels restless and dissatisfied under the anxieties of ignorance. It longs for the repose of conviction; and to gain this repose it will often rather precipitate its conclusions than wait for the tardy lights of observation and experiment. There is such a thing, too, as the love of simplicity and system, a prejudice of the understanding which disposes it to include al the phenomena of nature under a few sweeping generalities, and indolence which loves to repose on the beauties of a theory rather than encounter the fatiguing detail of its evidences.

Character | Experiment | Ignorance | Indolence | Love | Mind | Nature | Observation | Phenomena | Prejudice | Repose | Simplicity | System | Understanding | Will |

Joseph Conrad, born Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski

No man succeeds in everything he undertakes. In that sense we are all failures. The great point is not to fail in ordering and sustaining the effort of our life.

Character | Effort | Life | Life | Man | Sense |

Shalom Cohen

A brilliant mind without faith is like a beautiful face without eyes.

Character | Faith | Mind | Wisdom |

William Ellery Channing

Reading furnishes the mind only with the materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours.

Character | Knowledge | Mind | Reading | Thinking |

G. K. Chesterton, fully Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Merely having an open mind is nothing. The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.

Character | Mind | Nothing | Object |

Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche

True compassion is utterly neutral and is moved by suffering of every sort, not tied to right and wrong, attachment and aversion.

Character | Compassion | Right | Suffering | Wrong |

Edwin Hubbell Chapin

The angels may have wider spheres of action, may have nobler forms of duty; but right with them and with us is one and the same thing.

Action | Angels | Character | Duty | Right |