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

Saint Paul, aka The Apostle Paul, Paul the Apostle or Saul of Tarsus NULL

I consider the sufferings of the present to be as nothing, compared with the glory to be revealed within us.

Character | Glory | Nothing | Present |

Jianzhi Sengcan, Third Patriarch of Zen, Third Patriarch of Ch'an

The Perfect Way knows no difficulties, except that it refuses to make preferences. Only when freed from hate and love does it reveal itself fully and without disguise. A tenth of an inch’s difference, and heaven and earth are set apart. If you wish to see it before your own eyes have no fixed thoughts either for or against it. To set up what you like against what you dislike - this is the disease of the mind. When the deep meaning of the Way is not understood. Peace of mind is disturbed to no purpose... Pursue not the outer entanglements, dwell not in the inner void; be serene in the oneness of things, and dualism vanishes of itself... Transformations going on in the empty world that confronts us appear to be real because of Ignorance. Do not strive to seek after the True, only cease to cherish opinions... One in all, All in One - if only this is realized, no more worry about not being perfect. When the mind and each believing mind and Mind, this is where words fail, for it is not of the past, present or future.

Character | Disease | Disguise | Earth | Future | Hate | Heaven | Ignorance | Love | Meaning | Mind | Oneness | Past | Peace | Present | Purpose | Purpose | Words | World | Worry |

Oliver North, fully Lt. Colonel Oliver Laurence North

We are not here to predict the future but to change it for the good.

Change | Character | Future | Good |

Rabbi Eliezer ben Isaac Papo, aka "ha-Kosesh" or "The Saint"

By analyzing your worries, you will become aware that all worry is useless. Worries fall into two categories: worrying about the past and worrying about the future. As regards to the past, worry will not change the situation. You are compounding your suffering or loss by your present worrying. If you are worrying about something that might happen in the future, do what you can to protect yourself and prevent a loss. If there is nothing you can do, all your worrying will make no difference. So why waste your present moments worrying?

Change | Character | Future | Nothing | Past | Present | Suffering | Waste | Will | Worry | Loss |

Theodore Parker

Our reverence for the past is just in proportion to our ignorance of it.

Character | Ignorance | Past | Reverence |

Plotinus NULL

External objects present us only with appearances.

Character | Present |

John Charles Salak

Let us think only of spending the present day well. then when tomorrow shall have come, it will be called today, and then we will think about it.

Character | Day | Present | Tomorrow | Will | Think |

Elihu Root

Moral disarmament is to safe-guard the future; material disarmament is to save the present, that there may be a future to safeguard.

Character | Future | Present | Safe |

Sallust, full name Carus Valerius Sailustius Crispus NULL

Every man is the architect of his own future (fortune).

Character | Fortune | Future | Man |

Sydney Smith

That charity alone endures which flows from a sense of duty and a hope in God. this is the charity that treads in secret those paths of misery from which all but the lowest of human wretches have fled; this is that charity which no labor can weary, no ingratitude detach, no horror disgust; that toils, that pardons, that suffers; that is seen by no man, and honored by no man, but, like the great laws of Nature, does the work of God in silence, and looks to a future and better world for its reward.

Better | Character | Charity | Duty | Future | God | Hope | Ingratitude | Labor | Looks | Man | Nature | Reward | Sense | Silence | Work | World | God |

William Gilmore Simms

Have I done anything for society? I have then done more for myself. Let that truth be always present to thy mind, and work without cessation.

Character | Mind | Present | Society | Truth | Work |