Great Throughts Treasury

"To bear up under loss; to fight the bitterness of defeat and the weakness of grief; to be victor over anger, to smile when tears are close; to resist disease and evil men and base instincts; to hate hate and to love love; to go on when it would seem good to die; to look up with unquenchable faith in something ever more about to be - that is what any man can do, and be great."

"A man can die. He is glorious when he calmly accepts death; but when he fights like a tiger, when he stands at bay his back to the wall, a broken weapon in his hand, bloody, defiant, game to the end, then he is sublime. Then he wrings respect from the souls of even his bitterest foes. Then he is avenged even in his death."

"Adam Larey gazed with hard and wondering eyes down the silent current of the red river upon which he meant to drift away into the desert."

"And as he lost that softness of nature, so he lost his fear of men. He would watch for Oldring, biding his time, and he would kill this great black-bearded rustler who had held a girl in bondage, who had used her to his infamous ends."

"At sunset hour the forest was still, lonely, sweet with tang of fir and spruce, blazing in gold and red and green; and the man who glided on under the great trees seemed to blend with the colors and, disappearing, to have become a part of the wild woodland."

"At the end of a dry, uphill ride over barren country Jean Isbel unpacked to camp at the edge of the cedars where a little rocky canon, green with willow and cottonwood, promised water and grass."

"Fishing is a condition of the mind wherein one cannot have a bad time."

"For some reason the desert scene before Lucy Bostil awoke varying emotions ? a sweet gratitude for the fullness of her life there at the Ford, yet a haunting remorse that she could not be wholly content ? a vague loneliness of soul ? a thrill and a fear for the strangely calling future, glorious, unknown."

"Every once in a while I feel the tremendous force of the novel. But it does not stay with me."

"But what can women do in times of war? They help, they cheer, they inspire, and if their cause is lost they must accept death or worse. Few women have the courage for self-destruction. To the victor belong the spoils, and women have ever been the spoils of war."

"At the end of the day faith is a funny thing. It turns up when you don't really expect it. Its like one day you realize that the fairy tale may be slightly different than you dreamed. The castle, well, it may not be a castle. And its not so important happy ever after, just that its happy right now. See once in a while, once in a blue moon, people will surprise you , and once in a while people may even take your breath away."

"He saw his enemies stealthily darting from rock to tree, and tree to bush, creeping through the brush, and slipping closer and closer every moment. On three sides were his hated foes and on the remaining side?the abyss. Without a moment's hesitation the intrepid Major spurred his horse at the precipice. Never shall I forget that thrilling moment. The three hundred savages were silent as they realized the Major's intention. Those in the fort watched with staring eyes. A few bounds and the noble steed reared high on his hind legs. Outlined by the clear blue sky the magnificent animal stood for one brief instant, his black mane flying in the wind, his head thrown up and his front hoofs pawing the air like Marcus Curtius' mailed steed of old, and then down with a crash, a cloud of dust, and the crackling of pine limbs."

"He stalked into the room, leaned his long rifle against the mantelpiece and spread out his hands to the fire. He was clad from head to foot in fringed and beaded buckskin, which showed evidence of a long and arduous tramp. It was torn and wet and covered with mud. He was a magnificently made man, six feet in height, and stood straight as an arrow. His wide shoulders, and his muscular, though not heavy, limbs denoted wonderful strength and activity. His long hair, black as a raven's wing, hung far down his shoulders. Presently he turned and the light shone on a remarkable face. So calm and cold and stern it was that it seemed chiselled out of marble. The most striking features were its unusual pallor, and the eyes, which were coal black, and piercing as the dagger's point."

"I am full of fire and passion. I am not ready yet for great concentration and passion."

"I am tired. My arm aches. My head boils. My feet are cold. But I am not aware of any weakness."

"I am waiting to plunge down, to shatter and crash, roar and boom, to bury your trail, and close forever the outlet to Deception Pass!"

"I arise full of eagerness and energy, knowing well what achievement lies ahead of me."

"Halt!... Wade leaped at the white Belllounds. If you run I'll break a leg for you--an' then I'll beat your miserable brains out!... Have you no sense? Can't you recognize what's comin'?... I'm goin' to kill you, Buster Jack!"

"Get up, an' take my scarf, said Wade, an' bandage these bullet-holes I got."

"I can write best in the silence and solitude of the night, when everyone has retired."

"I confess that reading proofs is a pleasure. It stimulates and inspires me."

"I did not have one bad spell during writing - an unprecedented record."

"I hope I have found myself, my work, my happiness - under the light of the western skies."

"I hate birthdays."

"I knew you?d never be American enough to help me reconstruct my life."

"I love my work but do not know how I write it."

"I must go deeper and even stronger into my treasure mine and stint nothing of time, toil, or torture."

"I need this wild life, this freedom."

"I see so much more than I used to see. The effect has been to depress and sadden and hurt me terribly."

"I will see this game of life out to its bitter end"

"I wrote for nearly six hours. When I stopped, the dark mood, as if by magic, had folded its cloak and gone away."

"If I fished only to capture fish, my fishing trips would have ended long ago."

"Instantly a thick blackness seemed to enfold her and silence as of a dead world settled down upon her. Drowsy as she was she could not close her eyes nor refrain from listening. Darkness and silence were tangible things. She felt them. And they seemed suddenly potent with magic charm to still the tumult of her, to sooth and rest, to create thought she had never thought before. Rest was more than selfish indulgence. Loneliness was necessary to gain conciseness of the soul."

"It was a decent New Year's, but it took a million officers to make it so."

"It was the elision of the weaker element--the survival of the fittest; and some, indeed very many, mothers must lose their sons that way."

"Jealousy is an unjust and stifling thing."

"Late in June the vast northwestern desert of wheat began to take on a tinge of gold, lending an austere beauty to that endless, rolling, smooth world of treeless hills, where miles of fallow ground and miles of waving grain sloped up to the far-separated homes of the heroic men who had conquered over sage and sand."

"Like an arrow sprung from a bow Betty flashed past the Colonel and out on the green. Scarcely ten of the long hundred yards had been covered by her flying feet when a roar of angry shouts and yells warned Betty that the keen-eyed savages saw the bag of powder and now knew they had been deceived by a girl."

"Love grows more tremendously full, swift, poignant, as the years multiply."

"Love of man for woman - love of woman for man. That's the nature, the meaning, the best of life itself. - Zane Grey"

"Love of man for woman - love of woman for man. That's the nature, the meaning, the best of life itself."

"Men may rise on stepping stones of their dead selves to higher things."

"Mister Hawe, you come along, not satisfied with ropin?."

"My God! whispered the other, understanding fully at last."

"No nerve, hey? Not half a man!... Buster Jack, why don't you finish game? Make up for your low-down tricks. At the last try to be worthy of your dad. In his day he was a real man.... Let him have the consolation that you faced Hell-Bent Wade an' died in your boots!"

"No one connected intimately with a writer has any appreciation of his temperament, except to think him overdoing everything."

"People live for the dream in their hearts. And I have yet to know anyone who has not some secret dream, some hope, however dim, some storied wall to look at in the dusk, some painted window leading to the soul."

"Pride would never be her ally."

"Realism is death to me. I cannot stand life as it is."

"Recipe For Greatness - To bear up under loss; To fight the bitterness of defeat and the weakness of grief; To be victor over anger; To smile when tears are close; To resist disease and evil men and base instincts; To hate hate and to love love; To go on when it would seen good to die; To look up with unquenchable faith in something ever more about to be. That is what any man can do, and be great."