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

Richard and Mary-Alice Jafolla

The key to prosperity is the realization that prosperity doesn’t come by getting more. It comes by giving more... You do not deprive someone else when you prosper, as the Source is unlimited.

Character | Giving | Prosperity |

Garrison Keillor, fully Gary Edward "Garrison" Keillor

There is no lovelier way to thank God for your sight than by giving a helping hand to someone in the dark.

Character | Giving | God | God |

Holger Kalweit

The fool exposes the limitations of human criteria, confronts us anew with the undefined nature of our cosmic existence, leads us backstage to make us aware of the artificiality of our cultural values, and then shows us a world without limit, because it is neither categorized nor ordered in accordance with artificial opposites. The sick jester removes these opposites, tears down external and internal barriers and causes us to tumble head over heels from our tailor-made world of lines and demarcations into a more comprehensive and holistic dimension that has no beginning or end.

Beginning | Character | Existence | Nature | Tears | World |

Philip Kapleau

In giving yourself over wholly to whatever you are doing at the moment you can achieve a deeper and richer state of mind.

Character | Giving | Mind |

Donald Anderson Laird

Friendliness is contagious. The trouble is, many of us wait to catch it from someone else, when we might better be giving them a chance to catch it from us.

Better | Chance | Character | Giving | Trouble |

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Pity may represent little more than impersonal concern which prompts the mailing of a check, but true sympathy is the personal concern which demands the giving of one's soul.

Character | Giving | Little | Pity | Soul | Sympathy |

Juvenal, fully Decimus Junius Juvenalis NULL

Nature, in giving tears to man, confessed that he had a tender heart: this is our noblest quality.

Character | Giving | Heart | Man | Nature | Tears |

Johann Kaspar Lavater

The manner of giving shows the character of the giver more than the gift itself.

Character | Giving |

Johann Kaspar Lavater

He who always seeks more light the more he finds, and finds more the more he seeks, is one of the few happy mortals who take and give in every point of time. The tide and ebb of giving and receiving is the sum of human happiness, which he alone enjoys who always wishes to acquire new knowledge, and always finds it.

Character | Giving | Happy | Knowledge | Light | Time | Wishes |

Chief Luther Standing Bear

Praise, flattery, exaggerated manners, and fine, high-sounding words were no part of Lakota politeness. Excessive manners were put down as insincere, and the constant talker was considered rude and thoughtless. Conversation was never begun at once, or in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation.

Beginning | Character | Conversation | Flattery | Giving | Important | Manners | Praise | Question | Thought | Time | Words | Thought |

Yechezkail Levenstein

The commandment to love the Almighty requires that we should be willing to give up our lives if necessary out of love for Him. If a person has internalized that in reality he is a soul and his body is merely an outer garment that he temporarily wears, he will find it relatively easy to fulfill the commandment of giving up his life is need be. He does not feel as if he is sacrificing himself for he always retains his soul. His body which he is sacrificing is not himself but only an outer garment. For such a person giving up his life is not the ultimate sacrifice since his body is not an integral part of his identity.

Body | Character | Giving | Life | Life | Love | Need | Reality | Sacrifice | Soul | Will |

Robert J. McCracken, D.D.

The most infectiously joyous men and women are those who forget themselves in thinking about others and serving others. Happiness comes not by deliberately courting and wooing it but by giving oneself in self-effacing surrender to great values.

Character | Giving | Men | Self | Surrender | Thinking | Happiness |

Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

Learning is not to be tacked to the mind, but we must fuse and blend them together, not merely giving the mind a slight tincture, but a thorough and perfect dye. and if we perceive no evident change and improvement, it would be better to leave it alone; learning is a dangerous weapon, and apt to wound its master if it be wielded by a feeble hand, and by one not well acquainted with its use.

Better | Change | Character | Giving | Improvement | Learning | Mind |

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

When a law is proposed in the people’s assembly, what is asked of them is not precisely whether they approve of the proposition or reject it, but whether it is in conforming with the general will which is theirs; each by giving his vote gives his opinion on this question, and the counting of votes yields a declaration of the general will. When, therefore, the opinion contrary to my own prevails, this proves only that I have made a mistake, and that what I believed to be the general will was not so. If my particular opinion had prevailed against the general will, I should have done something other than what I had willed, and then I should not have been free. This presupposes, it is true, that all characteristics of the general will are still to be found in the majority; when these cease to be there, no matter what position men adopt, there is no longer any freedom.

Character | Freedom | Giving | Law | Majority | Men | Mistake | Opinion | People | Position | Question | Will |

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Luxury, which cannot be prevented among men who are tenacious of their own convenience and of the respect paid them by others, soon completes the evil society had begun, and, under the pretense of giving bread to the poor, whom it should never have made such, impoverishes all the rest, and sooner or later depopulates the State.

Character | Evil | Giving | Luxury | Men | Respect | Rest | Society | Society | Respect |

Nancy Reagan, born Anne Frances Robbins

Love means giving one’s self to another person fully, not just physically. When two people really love each other, this helps them to stay alive and grow. One must be loved to grow. Love’s such a precious and fragile thing that when it comes we have to hold on tightly. And when it comes, we’re very lucky because for some it never comes at all. If you have love, you’re wealthy in a way that can never be measured.

Character | Giving | Love | Means | People | Self |