Great Throughts Treasury

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.

Peace

"Peace rules the day, where reason rules the mind." - William Collins

"No nation ever had an army large enough to guarantee it against attack in time of peace or insure it victory in time of war." - Calvin Coolidge, fully John Calvin Coolidge, Jr.

"The child's entire life is influenced by his ability to listen. Good listening habits make it possible for him to broaden his knowledge, enjoy music, conversation, storytelling, drama; discriminating listening makes it possible for him to select radio and television programs for enjoyment. Critical listening helps him function intelligently in selection of governmental leaders. It is quite possible that the ability to listen effectively may be one of the most valuable tools he can use in his efforts to bring understanding and peace to the world." - Lucile Cypreansen

"Man-made barriers, laws, social customs and prejudices continue to keep a majority of women in an inferior position without full control of our lives and bodies. From infancy throughout life, in personal and public relations, in the family, in the schools, in every occupation and profession, too often we find our individuality, our capabilities, our earning powers diminished by discriminatory practices and outmoded ideas of what a woman is, what a woman can do, and what a woman must be... We lack effective political and economic power We have only minor and insignificant roles in making, interpreting and enforcing our laws, in running our political parties, businesses, unions, schools and institutions, in directing the media, in governing our country, in deciding issues of war or peace. We do not seek special privileges, but we demand as a human right a full voice and role for women in determining the destiny of our world, our nation, our families and our individual lives." - Declaration of American Women NULL

"The only way to abolish war (is) to make peace heroic." - John Dewey

"Peace comes only from loving, from mutual self-sacrifice and self-forgetfulness. Few today have humility or wisdom enough to know the world's deep need of love. We are too much possessed by national and racial and cultural pride." - Horace William Baden Donegan

"The free state offers what a police state denies - the privacy of the home, the dignity and peace of mind of the individual." -

"All progress is made by men of faith who believe in what is right and, what is more important, actually do what is right in their own private affairs. You cannot add to the peace and goodwill of the world if you fail to create an atmosphere of harmony and love right where you live and work." - Thomas Dreier

"If a conference lasts a long time, it must end in peace; no one can keep on defying his enemies all day." - Alfred Duggan

"The "price of peace" can never reach such dimensions as to equal the smallest fraction of war's deadly cost." - Abba Eban, born Aubrey Solomon Meir Eban

"Temperance is to the body what religion is to the soul, the foundation and source of health and strength and peace." - Tyron Edwards

"The great task of peace is to work morals into it. The only sort of peace that will be real is one in which everybody takes his share or responsibility. World organizations and conferences will be of no value unless there is improvement in the relation of men to men." - Frederic Eggleston, fully Sir Frederic William Eggleston

"In war it serves that we may poison and mutilate each other. In peace it has made our lives hurried and uncertain. Instead of freeing us in great measure from spiritually exhausting labor, it has made men into slaves of machinery, who for the most part complete their monotonous long days' work with disgust and must continually tremble for their poor rations." - Albert Einstein

"Our schoolbooks glorify war and hide its horrors. They inculcate hatred in the veins of the children. I would teach peace rather than war. I would inculcate love rather than hate." - Albert Einstein

"Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding." - Albert Einstein

"Some political and social activities of the Catholic Church are detrimental and even dangerous for the community as a whole... [e.g.] the fight against birth control at a time when overpopulation [is] a serious obstacle to peace." - Albert Einstein

"Taking an active part in the solution of the problems of peace is a moral duty which no conscientious man can shirk." - Albert Einstein

"Unless the cause of peace based on law gathers behind it the force and zeal of a religion, it hardly can hope to succeed." - Albert Einstein

"I could not live in peace if I put the shadow of a willful sin between myself and God." - George Eliot, pen name of Mary Ann or Marian Evans

"Happiness is not in strength, or wealth, or power, or all three. It lies in ourselves, in true freedom, in the conquest of every ignoble fear, in perfect self-government, in a power of contentment and peace, and the even flow of life, even in poverty, exile, disease, and the very valley of the shadow of death." -

"If virtue promises happiness, prosperity and peace, then progress in virtue is progress in each of these; for to whatever point the perfection of anything brings us, progress is always an approach toward it." -

"The most disadvantageous peace is better than the most just war." -

"Genius is entitled to respect only when it promotes the peace and improves the happiness of mankind." - Robert Devereux, Lord Essex, 2nd Earl of Essex

"Beneath a free government there is nothing but the intelligence of the people to keep the people’s peace. Order must be preserved, not by a military police or regiments of horse-guards, but by the spontaneous concert of a well-informed population, resolved that the rights which have been rescued from despotism shall not be subverted by anarchy." - Edward Everett

"No earthly purpose satisfies man’s longing to find his eternal reason for being... Man seeks incessantly for the meaning of life until he discovers the single eternal purpose for his existence. That purpose is the same for every man and woman. God created us because He longs to enter into fellowship with us. We belong to Him by right of creation. We can never know order and harmony in this life until we choose to establish a right relationship with God... Our search for meaning to life will end only when we establish that personal relationship with God and begin our walk with Him - for time and for eternity. Then comes that glorious personal fulfillment described in holy writ as the “peace that passes all understanding.”" - Jerry Falwell

"“Knowledge, without common sense," says Lee, "is folly; without method, it is waste; without kindness, is it death." But with common sense, it is wisdom; with method, it is power; with charity, it is beneficence; with religion, it is virtue and life and peace." - Austin Madsen Farrer

"'Tis safest making peace with sword in hand." - George Farquhar

"Accustom yourself gradually to carry prayer into all your daily occupations. Speak, move, work, in peace, as if you were in prayer, as indeed you ought to be. Do everything with excitement, by the spirit of grace." - François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon

"How different the peace of god from that of the world! It calms the passions, preserves the purity of conscience, is inseparable from righteousness, unites us to God and strengthens us against temptations. The peace of the soul consists in an absolute resignation to the will of God." - François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon

"Speak, move, act in peace, as if you were in prayer. In truth, this is prayer." - François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon

"A man who experiences no genuine satisfaction in life does not want peace. People court war to escape meaninglessness and boredom, to be relieved of fear and frustration." -

"If there is to be peace in the world, peace must be established first in every human heart. All the trouble in the world is due to selfishness. It always has been and always will be." - Joseph Francis Flannelly

"No one can get inner peace by pouncing on it, by vigorously willing to have it. Peace is a margin of power around our daily need. Peace is a consciousness of springs too deep for earthly droughts to dry up. Peace is an awareness of reserves from beyond ourselves, so that our power is not so much in us as through us." - Harry Emerson Fosdick

"The very core of peace and love is imagination. All altruism springs from putting yourself in the other person's place." - Harry Emerson Fosdick

"Universal peace will be realized, not because man will become better, but because a new order of things, a new science, new economic necessities, will impose peace." - Anatole France, pen name of Jacques Anatole Francois Thibault

"Government... is neither business, nor technology, nor applied science. It is the art of making men live together in peace and with reasonable happiness." - Felix Frankfurter

"May we never see another war! For in my opinion, there never was a good war or a bad peace." - Benjamin Franklin

"There was never a good war or a bad peace." - Benjamin Franklin

"Rest is a state of peace between man and nature... Work is a symbol of conflict and discord; rest is an expression of dignity, peace and freedom." -

"The thing for which we prepare and which we earnestly expect usually comes upon us. Food is prepared to be eaten; clothing is made to be worn; munitions of war are produced to be used in warfare. Just as truly, preparations made for purposes of peace help to bring about the peaceful condition for which they are prepared." - Francis J. Gable

"By its existence, the Peace Movement denies that governments know best; it stands for a different order of priorities: the human race comes first." - Martha Gellhorn, fully Martha Ellis Gellhorn

"A peace that comes from fear and not from the heart is the opposite of peace." - Gersonides, abbreviation of first letters as RalBaG from Levi ben Gerson NULL

"We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessing of Peace." - William Ewart Gladstone

"Somewhere among the youth of today are minds capable of discovering ways to world peace, ways to deeper and more fulfilling lives, ways to new appreciations of beauty in art or literature or music, just as there have been minds capable of splitting the atom. Ours is the task of breaking through the thought barrier which keeps our young people from realizing their creative potentiality." - Samuel B. Gould

"I have never advocated war, except as a means of peace." - Ulysses S. Grant, fully Ulysses Simpson Grant, born Hiram Ulysses Grant

"Peace is the first thing the angels sang. Peace is the mark of the sons of God. Peace is the nurse of love. Peace is the mother of unity. Peace is the rest of blessed souls. Peace is the dwelling place of eternity." - Pope Leo I, aka Pope Leo The Great, Pope Saint Leo I NULL

"Peace among nations, like happiness for the individual, is not an end, but a by-product that usually comes when you live right." - Edward Howard Griggs

"Faith is the backbone of the social and the foundation of the commercial fabric; remove faith between man and man, and society and commerce fall to pieces. There is not a happy home on earth but stands on faith; our heads are pillowed on it, we sleep at night in its arms with greater security for the safety of our lives, peace, and prosperity than bolts and bars can give." - Thomas Guthrie

"People are afraid to think, or they don't know how. They fail to realize that, while emotions can't be surpressed, the mind can be strengthened. All over the world people are seeking peace of mind, but there can be no peace of mind without strength of mind." - Erich Gutkind

"Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel had said: "The world rests on three things: On justice, on truth, on peace." Said Rabbi Mona: "But these are one and the same: For if there is justice, there is truth, and if there is truth, there is peace."" - Perek Ha-Shalom