Great Throughts Treasury

"A moral, sensible and well-bred man will not affront me, and no other can." - William Cowper

"A great mind will neither give an affront, nor bear it." - Henry Home, Lord Kames

"Arrogance in persons of merit affronts us more than arrogance in those without merit: merit itself is an affront." -

"All persons as they become less prosperous, are the more suspicious. They take everything as an affront; and from their conscious weakness, presume that they are neglected." -

"Any path is only a path. There is no affront to yourself or others in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you to do. But your decision to keep on the path or to leave it must be free of fear and ambition. I warn you, look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself and yourself alone one question. It is this: Does the path have a heart? Does this path have a heart is the only question. If it does, then the path is good. If it doesn't, it is of no use." -

"Any path is only a path, and there is no affront, to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you… Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself, and yourself alone, one question… Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn’t it is of no use." - Carlos Castaneda, fully Carlos César Salvador Arana Castaneda

"To weep excessively for the Dead, is to affront the Living." - Thomas Fuller

"All empty souls tend to extreme opinion. It is only in those who have built up a rich world of memories and habits of thought that extreme opinions affront the sense of probability. Propositions, for instance, which set all the truth upon one side can only enter rich minds to dislocate and strain, if they can enter at all, and sooner or later the mind expels them by instinct." - William Butler Yeats

"A great mind will neither give an affront nor bear it." -

"Divine love recognizes all good persons who enter our lives as expressions of God's love for us. Every friend — in the guise of relatives, friends, beloved, spouse — who is with us now or who has left this earth is a medium through which God Himself symbolizes His friendships. To ignore or abuse friendship, therefore, is an affront to God." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh

"That balancing moment at which pleasure would allure, and conscience is urging us to refrain, may be regarded as the point of departure or divergency whence one or other of the two processes (towards evil, or towards good) take their commencement. Each of them consists in a particular succession of ideas, with their attendant feelings; and whichever of them may happen to be described once has, by the law of suggestion, the greater chance, in the same circumstances, of being described over again. Should the mind dwell on an object of allurement, and the considerations of principle not be entertained, it will pass inward from the first incitement to the final and guilty indulgence by a series of stepping-stones, each of which will present itself more readily in future, and with less chance of arrest or interruption by the suggestions of conscience than before." - Thomas Chalmers

"It is far better that we admitted a thousand devils to roam at large than that we permitted one such imposter and monster as Moses, Joshua, Samuel, and the Bible prophets, to come with the pretended word of God and have credit among us." - Thomas Paine

"Since beauty is honoured all over the Empire, How could Xi Shi remain humbly at home? -- Washing clothes at dawn by a southern lake -- And that evening a great lady in a palace of the north: Lowly one day, no different from the others, The next day exalted, everyone praising her. No more would her own hands powder her face Or arrange on her shoulders a silken robe. And the more the King loved her, the lovelier she looked, Blinding him away from wisdom. ...Girls who had once washed silk beside her Were kept at a distance from her chariot. And none of the girls in her neighbours' houses By pursing their brows could copy her beauty. " - Wang Wei, aka Wang Youcheng

"An epigram is but a feeble thing - With straw in tail, stuck there by way of sting." - William Cowper

"On the haunted staircase of life, art is the only step that doesn't creak." - Tom Robbins, fully Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins

"The Revolution of 1848 found all the Rougons on the lookout, frustrated by their bad luck, and ready to use any means necessary to advance their cause. They were a family of bandits lying in wait, ready to plunder and steal." - Emile Zola