Great Throughts Treasury

"Every man deems that he has precisely the trials and temptations which are the hardest of all for him to bear; but they are so, because they are the very ones he needs. "

"Flowers never emit so sweet and strong a fragrance as before a storm approaches thee, be as fragrant as a sweet-smelling flower."

"He who has not lost his head over some things has no head to lose. "

"Fine minds are seldom fine souls. "

"If a child tells a lie, tell him that he has told a lie, but don't call him a liar. If you define him as a liar, you break down his confidence in his own character. "

"If adversity purifies men, why not nations?"

"If men had only temptations to great sins, they would always be good; but the daily fight with little ones accustoms them to defeat."

"It is a delightful thought that, during the familiarity of constant proximity, the heart gathers up in silence the nutriment of love, as the diamond, even beneath the water, imbibes the light it emits. Time, which deadens hatred, secretly strengthens love."

"If there were no future life, our souls would not thirst for it. "

"It is a well-known psychological fact that the conscience of children is formed by the influences that surround them; and that their notions of good and evil are the result of the moral atmosphere they breathe. "

"Let us accept different forms of religion among men, as we accept different languages, wherein there is still but one human nature expressed. Every genius has most power in his own language, and every heart in its own religion. "

"Look upon every day as the whole of life, not merely as a section; and enjoy and improve the present without wishing, through haste, to rush on to another. "

"It is good to respect old thoughts in the newest books, because the old works in which they stand are not read. New translations of many truths, as of foreign standard works, must be given forth every half-century."

"Man can only learn to rise from the consideration of that which he cannot surmount. "

"Love lessens woman's delicacy and increases man's. "

"Like a morning dream, life becomes more and more bright the longer we live, and the reason of everything appears more clear. What has puzzled us before seems less mysterious, and the crooked paths look straighter as we approach the end. "

"Man has here two and a half minutes - one to smile, one to sigh, and half an one to love; for in the midst of this minute he dies. "

"Music is the only one of the fine arts in which not only man, but all other animals, have a common property. "

"Memory is the only paradise from which we cannot be driven. "

"No man needs money so much as he who despises it. "

"More joyful eyes look at the setting, than at the rising sun. Burdens are laid down by the poor, whom the sun consoles more than the rich. I yearn toward him when he sets, not when he rises."

"No one is so much alone in the world as a denier of God. "

"Oh, only a free soul will never grow old! "

"No school is more necessary to children than patience, because either the will must be broken in childhood or the heart in old age. "

"Only a few persons influence the formation of our character. "

"Prayer purifies: it is a self-preached sermon. "

"Poverty is the only load which is the heavier the more loved ones there are to assist in supporting it. "

"Passion makes the best observations and draws the most wretched conclusions."

"Sleep, riches, and health are only truly enjoyed after they have been interrupted. "

"Since truthfulness, as a conscious virtue and sacrifice, is the blossom, nay, the pollen, of the whole moral growth, it can only grow with its growth, and open when it has reached its height."

"Sorrow causes more absence of mind and confusion than so-called levity. "

"Sorrows are like thunderclouds - in the distance they look black, over our heads scarcely gray. "

"Strong feelings do not necessarily make a strong character. The strength of a man is to be measured by the power of the feelings he subdues, not by the power of those which subdue him... Cultivate consideration for the feelings of other people if you would not have your own injured. "

"The contemplation of night should lead to elevating rather than to depressing ideas. Who can fix his mind on transitory and earthly things, in presence of those glittering myriads of worlds; and who can dread death or solitude in the midst of this brillings, animated universe, composed of countless suns and worlds, all full of light and life and motion?"

"Tears of joy are the dew in which the sun of righteousness is mirrored. "

"The apparently irreconcilable dissimilarity between our wishes and our means, between our hearts and this world, remains a riddle. "

"The earlier in life the first fright occurs, the more dangerous it is. "

"The guardian angel of life sometimes flies so high that man cannot see it; but he always is looking down upon us, and will soon hover nearer to us. "

"The miracles of earth are the laws of heaven."

"The long sleep of death closes our scars, and the short sleep of life our wounds. Sleep is the half of time which heals us. "

"The more weakness the more falsehood; strength goes straight; every cannon-ball that has in its hollows and holes goes crooked. Weaklings must lie. "

"The past and future are veiled; but the past wears the widow’s veil, the future, the virgin’s. "

"The youth of the soul is everlasting and eternity is youth. "

"Time is a continual over-dropping of moments, which fall down one upon the other and evaporate. "

"There is a long and wearisome step between admiration and imitation. "

"Time, which deadens hatred, secretly strengthens love; and in the hour of threatened separation its growth is manifested at once in radiant brightness. "

"Universal love is a glove without fingers, which fits all hands alike, and none closely; but true affection is like a glove with fingers, which fits one hand only, and sits closest to that one. "

"To love all mankind, from the greatest to the lowest, a cheerful state of being is required; but in order to see into mankind, into life, and still more into ourselves, suffering is requisite."

"To die for truth is not to die for one’s country, but to die for the world. "

"Unhappy is the man for whom his own mother has not made all other mothers venerable."