Great Throughts Treasury

"Amusement to an observing mind is study."

"Apologies only account for the evil which they cannot alter."

"All power is a trust - that we re accountable for its exercise."

"Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action."

"All must respect those who respect themselves."

"A precedent embalms a principle."

"A great work always leaves us in a state of musing."

"A consistent man believes in destiny, a capricious man in chance."

"A majority is always the best repartee."

"A man can know nothing of mankind without knowing something of himself. Self-knowledge is the property of that man whose passions have their full play, but who ponders over their results."

"All is mystery; but he is a slave who will not struggle to penetrate the dark veil."

"All my successes have been built on my failures."

"Eloquence is the child of knowledge."

"Change is inevitable in a progressive country. Change is constant."

"Every production of genius must be the production of enthusiasm."

"Great wealth is a great blessing to a man who knows what to do with it."

"Desperation is sometimes as powerful an inspirer as genius."

"Experience is the child of Thought, and Thought is the child of Action."

"Free trade is not a principle, it is an expedient."

"I have brought myself by long meditation to the conviction that a human being with a settled purpose must accomplish it, and that nothing can resist a will which will stake even existence upon its fulfillment."

"He who gains time gains everything."

"Grief is the agony of an instant: the indulgence of grief the blunder of a life."

"Ignorance never settles a question."

"Individuals may form communities, but it is institutions alone that can create a nation."

"It is the fashion to style the present moment an extraordinary crisis."

"Nature, like man, sometimes weeps for gladness."

"No government can be long secure without formidable opposition."

"Mediocrity can talk; but it is for genius to observe."

"Teach us that wealth is not elegance, that profusion is not magnificence, that splendor is not beauty."

"Nurture your mind with great thoughts; to believe in the heroic makes heroes."

"Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours."

"The disappointment of Manhood succeeds to the delusion of Youth; let us hope that the heritage of Old Age is not despair."

"The magic of first love is the ignorance that it can never end."

"The secret to success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes."

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

"The wisdom of the wise and the experience of ages may be preserved by quotation."

"The soul requires a sanctuary."

"There is no wisdom like frankness."

"Time is the great physician."

"Travel teaches toleration."

"Time will teach more than all our thoughts."

"We make our fortunes and we call them fate."

"Nurture your mind with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes."

"When we would prepare the mind by a forcible appeal, an opening quotation is a symphony precluding on the chords those tones we are about to harmonize."

"What we anticipate seldom occurs: but what we least expect generally happens."

"Without publicity there can be no public spirit, and without public spirit every nation must decay."

"Without tact you can learn nothing. Tact teaches you when to be silent."

"You know who the critics are? The men who failed in literature and art."

"Assassination has never changed the history of the world."

"A conservative government is an organized hypocrisy."