Great Throughts Treasury

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

Solitude

"At the beginning the aspirant should go into solitude now and then." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"Chant the name of God and sing his glories unceasingly; and keep holy company. Now and then one should visit holy men and devotees of God. If a man lives in the world and busies himself day and night with worldly duties and responsibilities, he cannot give his mind to God. So it's important to go into solitude from time to time, and think about God. When the plant is young, it should be fenced on all sides. Unless there's a fence around it, goats and cattle may eat it up." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"Even if one lives in the world, one must go into solitude now and then. It will be of great help to a man if he goes away from his family, lives alone, and weeps for God even for three days. Even if he thinks of God for one day in solitude, when he has the leisure, that too will do him good. People shed a whole jug of tears for wife and children. But who cries for the Lord? Now and then one must go into solitude and practice spiritual discipline to realize God." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"Householders should go into solitude now and then, to practice spiritual discipline in order to cultivate devotion to God; they should renounce mentally." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"If you ask me how long you should live in solitude away from your family, I should say that it would be good for you if you could spend even one day in such a manner. Three days at a time are still better. One may live in solitude for twelve days, a month, three months, or a year, according to one's convenience and ability. One hasn't much to fear if one leads the life of a householder after attaining knowledge and devotion." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"Iron, after it is converted into gold by the touch of philosopher's stone, may be kept under the ground or thrown into a rubbish heap; it will always remain gold and will not return to its former condition. Similar is the state of the man whose soul has touched, even once, the feet of the Almighty Lord. Whether he dwells in the bustle of the world, or in the solitude of the forest, nothing ever contaminates him." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"One must go into solitude to attain this divine love. To get butter from milk you must let it set into curd in a secluded spot; if it is too much disturbed, milk won't turn into curd. Next, you must put aside all other duties, sit in a quiet spot, and churn the curd. Only then do you get butter." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"The disease of worldliness is like typhoid. And there are a huge jug of water and a jar of savoury pickles in the typhoid patient's room. If you want to cure him of his illness, you must remove him from that room. The worldly man is like the typhoid patient. The various objects of enjoyment are the huge jug of water, and the craving for their enjoyment is his thirst. The very thought of pickles makes the mouth water; you don't have to bring them near. And he is surrounded with them. The companionship of woman is the pickles. Hence treatment in solitude is necessary." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"What are the spiritual disciplines that give the mind its upward direction? One learns all this by constantly living in holy company. The rishis of olden times lived either in solitude or in the company of holy persons; therefore they could easily renounce 'woman and gold' and 'fix their minds on God. They had no fear nor did they mind the criticism of others." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"When you meditate, go into the solitude of a forest, or a quiet corner, and enter into the chamber of your heart. And always keep your power of discrimination awake. God alone is real, that is to say, eternal; everything else is unreal, because it will pass away. As you discriminate in this manner, let your mind give up its attachment to the fleeting objects of this world. " - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"Whenever you have leisure, go into solitude for a day or two. At that time don't have any relations with the outside world and don't hold any conversation with worldly people on worldly affairs. You must live either in solitude or in the company of holy men." - Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

"I am not alone, For solitude like this is populous. And its abundant life of sky and sun, High-floating clouds, low mists, and wheeling birds, And waves that ripple shoreward all day long, Whether the tide is setting in or out, Forever rippling shoreward, dark and bright, As lights and shadows, and the shifting winds Pursue each other in their endless play, Is more than the companionship of man." - Richard Henry Stoddard

"It was from him I learned that the stage is too coarse a medium for the works of the supreme poet; Shakespeare's depths can only be plumbed in the solitude of the study. So I used to shut myself up and plumb away for hours, and I acquired such aptitude that for a time there was a belief that I might pipe Shakespeare into young minds of the rest of my days, as a full-fledged academic plumber." - Robertson Davies

"The trouble with solitude is that there is no one to share it with." - Robert Byrne, fully Robert Leo Byrne

"The bird of vision is flying towards you with the wings of desire." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL

"What does this patch-sewing mean you ask? Eating and drinking. The heavy cloak of the body is always getting torn. You patch it with food and other ego-satisfactions." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL

"As God sets the soul in this dark night… He allows it not to find attraction or sweetness in anything whatsoever. God transfers to the spirit the good things and the strength of the senses… if it is not immediately conscious of spiritual sweetness and delight, but only of aridity and lack of sweetness, the reason for this is the strangeness of the exchange. #6. If those souls to whom this comes to pass knew how to be quiet at this time… then they would delicately experience this inward refreshment in that ease and freedom from care… it is like the air which, if one would close one’s hand upon it, escapes. In this state of contemplation… it is God Who is now working in the soul. He binds its interior faculties, and allows it not to cling to the understanding, nor to have delight in the will, nor to reason with the memory. God communicates… by pure spirit. From this time forward imagination and fancy can find no support in any meditation." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL

"Desolation is a file, and the endurance of darkness is preparation for great light." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL

"God sustains every soul and dwells in it substantially, even though it be that of the greatest sinner in the world, and this union is natural. The supernatural union exists when God’s will and the soul’s will are in conformity. Therefore the soul rests transformed in God through love. The illumination of the soul and its union with God corresponds to its purity." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL

"In the dark night of the soul, bright flows the river of God." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL

"There is no act of charity that is not accompanied by justice or that permits us to do more than we reasonably can." - Saint Vincent de Paul

"Murder and theft have been committed since the earliest history of mankind, but that fact has not made murder meritorious or larceny legal." - Sam Ervin, fully Samuel James "Sam" Ervin, Jr.

"Conscience is the internal perception of the rejection of a particular wish operating within us." - Sigmund Freud, born Sigismund Schlomo Freud

"During the last quarter of a century all the authority associated with the function of spiritual guidance ... has seeped down into the lowest publications. ... Between a poem by Valéry and an advertisement for a beauty cream promising a rich marriage to anyone who used it there was at no point a breach of continuity. So as a result of literature’s spiritual usurpation a beauty cream advertisement possessed, in the eyes of little village girls, the authority that was formerly attached to the words of priests." - Simone Weil

"In struggling against anguish one never produces serenity; the struggle against anguish only produces new forms of anguish." - Simone Weil

"The intelligent man who is proud of his intelligence is like a condemned man who is proud of his large cell." - Simone Weil

"To write the lives of the great in separating them from their works necessarily ends by above all stressing their pettiness, because it is in their work that they have put the best of themselves." - Simone Weil

"In the face of an obstacle which is impossible to overcome, stubbornness is stupid." - Simone de Beauvoir, fully Simone-Ernestine-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir

"My style will acquire a specific character from the moment when it will not bother anything, to be exact, will not sleep. directly to court a woman that is the dumbest thing you want. That's why a woman would only untouched by vanity. and vanity of women is common place all philosophers. A and B are two sisters: If you like A like you really need to start by making court's B. .. arriving at the inn, I found there two rosy-cheeked young girl. both were nice. I grabbed her ass in the least pretty, I could have [..] but I thought it would be imprudent at the very beginning of the campaign. anyway I wasted all that melancholy which gnawed at me since I left and I was happy Pforzheim to Stuttgart. during his life the way I read Alfieri, vol 2. pretend you're a month or two but eventually all true character is revealed: we women do not necessarily hold. Martial had between 18 and 31 years, about 22 women, 12 of whom indeed after an amorous intrigue. I am 25 years old and over 10 years I have probably 6 women. I have also 20 horses now and until I will not be able to ride because of age. spirit is it substance or quality - put together with the bodily eye, eye consequence of existence? Locke's principle that all ideas come to us through the senses, and passions anatomy as shown in Helvetius prove that man can not see any effect in the soul, there are only effects of the senses, that there seem consequent soul. these two portraits of the Emperor are really great, but made ??him Appian lighting. apparently not conceive otherwise genius painters. the superior understanding that surprise humanly possible real relations between things and events with a dominating cold caution, they remain invisible. inconsistency is found that the sensitivity, the author [Schiller] not sufficiently deepened major ideas at last that his characters I have enough spirit [esprit]. them except some lengths to end pieces are good. but sensitivity founded on a series of vague ideas and swollen, like that of Werther, it seems a consequence of a specific nation spirit, does not touch me. Well the Germans cold explaining their food: black bread, butter, milk and beer. coffee yet but should drink wine, and since most, for animate them bloated muscles. Bible reading and then helped her to be silly and emphatic. Because it's actually acting and the British character. but the greatest rulers of the 18th century, Frederick II and Catherine II, belonged to this nation. - Stendhal , The Private Diaries of Stendhal" - Stendhal, pen name of Marie Henn Beyle or Marie-Henri Beyle NULL

"There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats." - Théophile Gautier, fully Pierre Jules Théophile Gautier, aka Le Bon Theo

"The sovereign invigorator of the body is exercise, and of all the exercises walking is the best." - Thomas Jefferson

"A state of conscience is higher than a state of innocence." - Thomas Mann, fully Paul Thomas Mann

"Solitude gives birth to the original in us, to beauty unfamiliar and perilous-to poetry. But also, it gives birth to the opposite: to the perverse, the illicit, the absurd." - Thomas Mann, fully Paul Thomas Mann

"Some of necessities go astray, because for them there is no such thing as a right path." - Thomas Mann, fully Paul Thomas Mann

"The oldest language, they say, Indo-European, Indo-European, which is Sanskrit. But it is almost certain that this is a great is so rashly like many others, and that there has been a re-older mother tongue, which decided the roots of the Aryan both as well as the Semitic and chamitischen dialects in itself. She probably has been spoken on Atlantis, whose silhouette is the final distance indistinct haze still visible Vorbirgskulisse the past, but which itself is hardly the original home of the people speaking well." - Thomas Mann, fully Paul Thomas Mann

"Every man becomes the image of the God he adores. He whose worship is directed to a dead thing becomes dead. He who loves corruption rots. He who loves a shadow becomes, himself, a shadow. He who loves things that must perish lives in dread of their perishing." - Thomas Merton

"I just remember their kindness and goodness to me, and their peacefulness and their utter simplicity. They inspired real reverence, and I think, in a way, they were certainly saints. And they were saints in that most effective and telling way: sanctified by leading ordinary lives in a completely supernatural manner, sanctified by obscurity, by usual skills, by common tasks, by routine, but skills, tasks, routine which received a supernatural form from grace within." - Thomas Merton

"It is in the ordinary duties and labors of life that we can and should develop our spiritual union with God." - Thomas Merton

"The married man and the mother of a family, if they are faithful to their obligations, will fulfill a mission that is as great as it is consoling: that of bringing into the world and forming young souls capable of happiness and love, souls capable of sanctification and transformation." - Thomas Merton

"There are days when I am convinced that Heaven starts already, now, in this ordinary life just as it is, in all its incompleteness, yet, this is where Heaven starts… see within yourself, if you can find it. I walked through the field in front of the house, lots of swallows flying, everywhere! Some very near me… it was magical. We are already one, yet we know it not." - Thomas Merton

"There is in us an instinct for newness, for renewal, for a liberation of creative power. We seek to awaken in ourselves a force that really changes our lives from within. And yet the same instinct tells us that this change is a recovery of that which is deepest, most original, most personal in ourselves. To be born again is not to become somebody else, but to become ourselves." - Thomas Merton

"When the light of God's truth begins to find its way through the mists of illusion and self-deception with which we have unconsciously surrounded ourselves, and when the image of God within us begins to return to itself, the false self which we inherited from Adam begins to experience the strange panic that Adam felt when, after his sin, he hid in the trees of the garden because he heard the voice of the Lord God in the afternoon." - Thomas Merton

"Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire." - Thomas Merton

"Praised are You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of the Universe, Creator of light and darkness, who make peace and fashions all things. In mercy, You illuminate the world and those who live upon it. In Your goodness You daily renew creation. How numerous are You works, Adonai! In wisdom, You formed them all, filling the earth with Your creatures. Be praised, Adonai our God, for the excellent work of your hands, And for the lights You created; may they glorify You. Shine a new light upon Zion, that we may swiftly merit its radiance. Praised are You Adonai, Creator of heavenly lights." - Union Prayer Book NULL

"The moon like a flower in heaven's high bower, with silent delight, sits and smiles on the night." - William Blake

"The mind, relaxing into needful sport, should turn to writers of an abler sort, whose wit well managed, and whose classic style, give truth a lustre, and make wisdom smile." - William Cowper

"It is worthy to note, that the early popularity of Washington was not the result of brilliant achievement nor signal success; on the contrary, it rose among trials and reverses, and may almost be said to have been the fruit of defeat." - Washington Irving

"The Idea of Order at Key West - She sang beyond the genius of the sea. The water never formed to mind or voice, like a body wholly body, fluttering its empty sleeves; and yet its mimic motion made constant cry, caused constantly a cry, that was not ours although we understood, inhuman, of the veritable ocean. The sea was not a mask. No more was she. The song and water were not medleyed sound even if what she sang was what she heard, since what she sang was uttered word by word. It may be that in all her phrases stirred the grinding water and the gasping wind; but it was she and not the sea we heard. For she was the maker of the song she sang. The ever-hooded, tragic-gestured sea was merely a place by which she walked to sing. Whose spirit is this? we said, because we knew it was the spirit that we sought and knew that we should ask this often as she sang. If it was only the dark voice of the sea that rose, or even colored by many waves; if it was only the outer voice of sky and cloud, of the sunken coral water-walled, however clear, it would have been deep air, the heaving speech of air, a summer sound repeated in a summer without end and sound alone. But it was more than that, more even than her voice, and ours, among the meaningless plungings of water and the wind, theatrical distances, bronze shadows heaped on high horizons, mountainous atmospheres of sky and sea. It was her voice that made the sky acutest at its vanishing. She measured to the hour its solitude. She was the single artificer of the world in which she sang. And when she sang, the sea, whatever self it had, became the self that was her song, for she was the maker. Then we, as we beheld her striding there alone, knew that there never was a world for her except the one she sang and, singing, made. Ramon Fernandez, tell me, if you know, why, when the singing ended and we turned toward the town, tell why the glassy lights, the lights in the fishing boats at anchor there, as the night descended, tilting in the air, mastered the night and portioned out the sea, fixing emblazoned zones and fiery poles, arranging, deepening, enchanting night. Oh! Blessed rage for order, pale Ramon, the maker's rage to order words of the sea, words of the fragrant portals, dimly-starred, and of ourselves and of our origins, in ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds." - Wallace Stevens

"Who can think of the sun costuming clouds when all people are shaken or of night endazzled, proud, when people awaken and cry and cry for help?" - Wallace Stevens