Great Throughts Treasury

"No wonder we are all more or less pleased with mediocrity, since it leaves us at rest, and gives the same comfortable feeling as when one associates with his equals." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"The soul, by an instinct stronger than reason, ever associates beauty with truth." - Henry Theodore Tuckerman

"Great men with great truths have seldom had much support from their associates." -

"When enthusiasm is inspired by reason; controlled by caution; sound in theory; practical in application; reflects confidence; spreads good cheer; raises morale; inspires associates; arouses loyalty, and laughs at adversity, it is beyond price." - Coleman Cox

"A subtle fluid which pervades the universe, and associates all things in mutual intercourse and harmony." - Franz Mesmer, fully Franz Anton Mesmer, incorrectly referred as Friedrich Anton Mesmer

"We are far more liable to catch the vices than the virtues of our associates." - Denis Diderot

"Greatness, in the last analysis, is largely bravery - courage in escaping from old ideas and old standards and respectable ways of doing things. This is one of the chief elements in what we vaguely call capacity. If you do not dare differ from your associates and teachers you will never be great or your life sublime. You may be the happier as a result, or you may be miserable. Each of us is great insofar as we perceive and act on the infinite possibilities which lie undiscovered and unrecognized about us." - James Harvey Robinson

"For my part, it is not the mystery of the incarnation which I discover in religion, but the mystery of social order, which associates with heaven that idea of equality which prevents the rich from destroying the poor." - Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon I

"Whom do I call educated? First, those who manage well the circumstances they encounter day by day. Next, those who are decent and honorable in their intercourse with all men, bearing easily and good naturedly what is offensive in others and being as agreeable and reasonable to their associates as is humanly possible to be... those who hold their pleasures always under control and are not ultimately overcome by their misfortunes... those who are not spoiled by their successes, who do not desert their true selves but hold their ground steadfastly as wise and sober -- minded men." - Socrates NULL

"I seek not a fellow feeling in my misery. No sympathy may I ever find. When I first sought it, it was the love of virtue, the feelings of happiness and affection with which my whole being overflowed, that I wished to be participated. But now that virtue has become to me a shadow, and that happiness and affection are turned into bitter and loathing despair, in what should I seek for sympathy? I am content to suffer alone while my sufferings shall endure; when I die, I am well satisfied that abhorrence and opprobrium should load my memory. Once my fancy was soothed with dreams of virtue, of fame, and of enjoyment. Once I falsely hoped to meet with beings who, pardoning my outward form, would love me for the excellent qualities which I was capable of unfolding. I was nourished with high thoughts of honour and devotion. But now crime has degraded me beneath the meanest animal. No guilt, no mischief, no malignity, no misery, can be found comparable to mine. When I run over the frightful catalogue of my sins, I cannot believe that I am the same creature whose thoughts were once filled with sublime and transcendent visions of the beauty and the majesty of goodness. But it is even so; the fallen angel becomes a malignant devil. Yet even that enemy of God and man had friends and associates in his desolation; I am alone." - Mary Shelley, née Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin

"We habitually erect a barrier called blame that keeps us from communicating genuinely with others, and we fortify it with our concepts of who's right and who's wrong. We do that with the people who are closest to us and we do it with political systems, with all kinds of things that we don't like about our associates or our society. It is a very common, ancient, well-perfected device for trying to feel better. Blame others. Blaming is a way to protect your heart, trying to protect what is soft and open and tender in yourself. Rather than own that pain, we scramble to find some comfortable ground." - Pema Chödrön, born Deirdre Blomfield-Brown

"Man associates ideas not according to logic or verifiable exactitude, but according to his pleasure and interests. It is for this reason that most truths are nothing but prejudices." - Remy de Gourmont

"Obedience is not truly performed by the body, if the heart is dissatisfied." - Sa'di (or Saadi), pen name of Abū-Muḥammad Muṣliḥ al-Dīn bin Abdallāh Shīrāzī, born Muslih-uddin NULL

"But we did try to think ahead some when it came to the cities. We never planned on actually going into the cities. What we did instead was build our stores in a ring around a city – pretty far out – and wait for the growth to come to us. This strategy worked practically everywhere." - Sam Walton, fully Samuel Moore "Sam" Walton

"It is a story about entrepreneurship, and risk, and hard work, and knowing where you want to go and being willing to do what it takes to get there. And it’s a story about believing in your idea even when maybe some other folks don’t, and about sticking to your guns." - Sam Walton, fully Samuel Moore "Sam" Walton

"The Patronising of Rascals is a form of the appetite for vice." - Theophrastus NULL

"Parliament will train you to talk; and above all things to hear, with patience, unlimited quantities of foolish talk" - Thomas Carlyle

"Great teachers give us a sense not only of who they are, but more important, of who we are, and who we might become. They unlock our energies, our imaginations, and our minds. Effective teachers pose compelling questions, explain options, teach us to reason, suggest possible directions, and urge us on. The best teachers, like the best leaders, have an uncanny ability to step outside themselves and become liberating forces in our lives." - Thomas Cronin, fully Thomas Edward Cronin

"It’s class warfare; my class is winning, but they shouldn’t be." - Warren Buffett, fully Warren Edward Buffett, aka Oracle of Omaha

"It's class warfare, my class is winning, but they shouldn't be." - Warren Buffett, fully Warren Edward Buffett, aka Oracle of Omaha

"How strange that nature does not knock, and yet does not intrude!" - Emily Dickinson, fully Emily Elizabeth Dickinson