Great Throughts Treasury

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

James Goldsmith

French Billionaire Financier and tycoon

"Fortune is ever seen accompanying industry."

"People seldom improve when they have no model but themselves to copy after."

"The fortunate circumstances of our lives are generally found, at last, to be our own producing."

"Tolerance is a tremendous virtue, but the immediate neighbors of tolerance are apathy and weakness."

"None has more frequent conversations with a disagreeable self than the man of pleasure; his enthusiasms are but few and transient; his appetites, like angry creditors, are continually making fruitless demands for what he is unable to pay; and the greater his former pleasures, the more strong his regret, the more impatient his expectations. A life of pleasure is, therefore, the most unpleasing life."

"Praise in the beginning is agreeable enough; and we receive it as a favor; but when it comes in great quantities, we regard it only as a debt, which nothing but our merit could extort."

"If you see a bandwagon, it's too late."