Great Throughts Treasury

"In an audience of rough people a generous sentiment always brings down the house. In the tumult of war both sides applaud an heroic deed." - Thomas Wentworth Higginson

"If I were authorized to address any word directly to our novelists, I should say: Do not trouble yourself about standards or ideals, but try to be faithful and natural." - William Howells, fully William Dean Howells, aka The Dean of American Letters

"What lasting progress was ever made in social reformation, except when every step was insured by appeals to the understanding and the will?" - William Matthews

"It is with sincere affection or friendship as with ghosts and apparitions,--a thing that everybody talks of, and scarce any hath seen." - François de La Rochefoucauld, François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac, Francois A. F. Rochefoucauld-Liancourt

"Self-love is more cunning than the most cunning man in the world." - François de La Rochefoucauld, François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac, Francois A. F. Rochefoucauld-Liancourt

"The art of using moderate abilities to advantage wins praise, and often acquires more reputation than actual brilliancy." - François de La Rochefoucauld, François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac, Francois A. F. Rochefoucauld-Liancourt

"The reason for misreckoning in expected returns of gratitude is that the pride of the giver and receiver can never agree about the value of the obligation." - François de La Rochefoucauld, François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac, Francois A. F. Rochefoucauld-Liancourt

"The sure way to be cheated is to think one's self more cunning than others." - François de La Rochefoucauld, François VI, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, Prince de Marcillac, Francois A. F. Rochefoucauld-Liancourt

"The Ministers and officials of the state should make proper behavior their first principle, for if the superiors do not behave properly, the inferiors are disorderly; if inferiors behave improperly, offenses will naturally result. Therefore when lord and vassal behave with propriety, the distinctions of rank are not confused: when the people behave properly the Government will be in good order." - Prince Shōtoku, born Shotoku Taishi, aka Prince Umayado or Prince Kamitsumiya

"Life is full of uncertainties, perhanps one day some unforeseen circumstance would bring her into his life once more." - Murasaki Shikibu, aka Lady Murasaki

"When you realize that samsara and nirvana are dharmakaya, you need not put effort into meditation practice." - Padmasambhava, literally "Lotus-Born",aka "Second Buddha", better known as Guru Rinpoche (lit. "Precious Guru") or Lopon Rinpoche NULL

"But I don't know how much more socializing I can do, Felipe. I only have the one dress. People will start to notice that I'm wearing the same thing all the time. You're young and beautiful, darling. You only need the one dress." - Elizabeth Gilbert

"If I were going to have such a short visit on earth, I had to do everything possible to experience it now." - Elizabeth Gilbert

"Most of humanity, he said, have eyes that are so caked shut with the dust of deception they will never see the truth, no matter who tries to help them." - Elizabeth Gilbert

"Men insist that they don't mind women succeeding so long as they retain their "femininity". Yet the qualities that men consider "feminine" timidity, submissiveness, obedience, silliness, and self-debasement — are the very qualities best guaranteed to assure the defeat of even the most gifted aspirant." - Elizabeth Gould Davis

"Men need women more than women need men; and so, aware of this fact, man has sought to keep woman dependent upon him economically as the only method open to him of making himself necessary to her." - Elizabeth Gould Davis

"I do consider a multitude doth make rather discord and confusion than good counsel." - Elizabeth II, born Elizabeth Alexandra May NULL

"Though the sex to which I belong is considered weak ... you will nevertheless find me a rock that bends to no wind." - Elizabeth II, born Elizabeth Alexandra May NULL

"In modern capitalism economic exploitation rather than political oppression is the real enemy of the people." - Emma Goldman

"The sentence in which God comes to be involved in words is not ‘I believe in God’… It is the ‘here I am’ said to the neighbor to whom I am given over, and in which I announce peace, that is, my responsibility for the other." - Emmanuel Lévinas , originally Emanuelis Lévinas

"The conscious discovery by you that you have this Power within you, and your determination to make use of it, is the birth of the child. And it is easy to see how very apt the symbol is, for the infant that is born in consciousness is just such a weak, feeble entity as any new-born child, and it calls for the same careful nursing and guarding that any infant does in its earliest days. After a time, however, as the weeks go by, the child grows stronger and bigger, until a time comes when it can well take care of itself; and then it grows and grows in wisdom and stature until, no longer leaning on the mother’s care, the child, now arrived at man’s estate, turns the tables, and repays its debt by taking over the care of its mother. So your ability to contact the mystic Power within yourself, frail and feeble at first, will gradually develop until you find yourself permitting that Power to take your whole life into its care." - Emmet Fox

"When you love you wish to do things for. You wish to sacrifice for. You wish to serve." - Ernest Hemingway, fully Ernest Miller Hemingway

"Ælian, in his account of Zoilus, the pretended critic, who wrote against Homer and Plato, and thought himself wiser than all who had gone before him, tells us that this Zoilus had a very long beard that hung down upon his breast, but no hair upon his head, which he always kept close shaved, regarding, it seems, the hairs of his head as so many suckers, which, if they had been suffered to grow, might have drawn away the nourishment from his chin, and by that means have starved his beard." - Eustace Budgell

"You can also offer your prayers, obedience, and endurance of dryness to Our Lord, for the good of other souls, and then you have practiced intercession. Never mind if it all seems for the time very second-hand. The less you get out of it, the nearer it approaches to being something worth offering; and the humiliation of not being able to feel as devout as we want to be, is excellent for most of us. Use vocal prayer... very slowly, trying to realize the meaning with which it is charged and remember that... you are only a unit in the Chorus of the Church, so that the others will make good the shortcomings you cannot help." - Evelyn Underhill

"Occasionally, we receive questions as to the propriety of Church members receiving government assistance instead of Church assistance. Let me restate what is a fundamental principle. Individuals, to the extent possible, should provide for their own needs. Where the individual is unable to care for himself, his family should assist. Where the family is not able to provide, the Church should render assistance, not the government." - Ezra Taft Benson

"With all my heart I love our great nation. I have lived and traveled abroad just enough to make me appreciate rather fully what we have in America. To me the U. S. is not just another nation. It is not just one of a family of nations. The U. S. is a nation with a great mission to perform for the benefit and blessing of liberty-loving people everywhere." - Ezra Taft Benson

"If you desire information on some point of law, you are not likely to ponder over the ponderous tomes of legal writers in order to obtain the knowledge you seek, by your own unaided efforts." - Felix Adler

"The world wags on with three things: doing, undoing, and pretending." - Italian Proverbs

"There goes more than one ass to market." - Italian Proverbs

"A synopsis is a cold thing. You do it with the front of your mind. If you're going to stay with it, you never get quite the same magic as when you're going all out." - J. B. Priestly, fully John Boynton Priestly

"I'm in the business of providing people with secondary satisfactions. It wouldn't have done me much good if they had all written their own plays, would it?" - J. B. Priestly, fully John Boynton Priestly