Great Throughts Treasury

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

Related Quotes

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

The body should be sound and healthy because only then we can have a healthy mind.

Body | Love | Nature |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

In the Divine Path, there is no chance of failure; it is the Path of Love.

Man | Money | Nature |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

Man is flying to the Moon and diving into the Sea; but he does not know how to live on Earth with his fellow men in Love and Peace. He moves towards the Moon for fear others may reach there before him and dives through the Sea to strike terror, himself terrified of others.

Appearance | Nature | Reality |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

The balanced persons will be active because it is their duty. They will not be agitated by anything - failure or success. The Godly will take up activity as a means of worshipping God; and they leave the result to God. They know that they are but instruments in the hands of God.

Distinction | God | Nature | Words | God | Vice |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

The night is dark and gloomy; how will the morning dawn?

Nature |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

We have all around us, in the atmosphere, the music emanating from all the Broadcasting Stations of the World, but they do not assail your ear at any time. You are not aware of any Station; but, if you have a receiver and if you tune it to the correct wavelength, you can hear the matter broadcast from any Station; if you fail to tune it correctly, you will get instead of news only nuisance.

Evil | Happy | Nature | Pain | Wrong |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

The Siblings of Destiny meet together, and eat and spend, but these resources do not diminish; they continue to increase.

Divinity | Love | Mind | Reason | Selfishness | Weakness |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

You must be uncomfortable when those around you are unhappy; when you ease their discomfort, you are making them happy and making yourself happy, isn't it?

Men | People | Praise | Strength | Weakness |

Atharva Veda, or Atharvaveda

To the animals of the earth and those of heaven, to the wild beasts of the forest, to the winged birds, do we speak, they shall deliver us from calamity.

Body | Important | Weakness |

Upanishads or The Upanishads NULL

Where there is separateness, one sees another, smells another, tastes another, speaks to another, hears another, touches another, thinks of another, knows another. But where there is unity, one without a second, that is the world of Brahman. This is the supreme goal of life, the supreme treasure, the supreme joy. Those who do not seek this Supreme goal live on but a fraction of this joy. - Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

Joy | Nature |

Ursula Le Guin, fully Ursula Kroeber Le Guin

It is our suffering that brings us together. It is not love. Love does not obey the mind, and turns to hate when forced. The bond that binds us is beyond choice. We are brothers. We are brothers in what we share. In pain, which each of us must suffer alone, in hunger, in poverty, in hope, we know our brotherhood. We know it, because we have had to learn it. We know that there is no help for us but from one another, that no hand will save us if we do not reach out our hand. And the hand that you reach out is empty, as mine is. You have nothing. You possess nothing. You own nothing. You are free. All you have is what you are, and what you give.

Better | Nature |

Ursula Le Guin, fully Ursula Kroeber Le Guin

How does one hate a country, or love one? Tibe talks about it; I lack the trick of it. I know people, I know towns, farms, hills and rivers and rocks, I know how the sun at sunset in autumn falls on the side of a certain plowland in the hills; but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply? What is love of one's country; is it hate of one's uncountry? Then it's not a good thing. Is it simply self-love? That's a good thing, but one mustn't make a virtue of it, or a profession... Insofar as I love life, I love the hills of the Domain of Estre, but that sort of love does not have a boundary-line of hate. And beyond that, I am ignorant, I hope.

Death | Love | Nature | Understand |

Upanishads or The Upanishads NULL

Where one sees another, one hears another, so long as there are two, there must be fear, and fear is the mother of all misery. Where none sees another, where it is all one, there is none to be miserable, none to be unhappy. – Chandogya Upanishad

Mind | Weakness | World |

Václav Havel

The role of the writer is not simply to arrange Being according to his own lights; he must also serve as a medium to Being and remain open to its often unfathomable dictates. This is the only way the work can transcend its creator and radiate its meaning further than the author himself can see or perceive.

Doubt | Integration | Man | Nature | Reality | Relationship | Science | World |

Valmiki NULL

If a person is gifting away his elephant but his heart is set on the rope used for tying the elephant, of what use is his attachment to the rope when he is giving away the elephant itself.

Nature | People | Friendship |

Vannevar Bush

Fear cannot be banished, but it can be calm and without panic and it can be mitigated by reason and evaluation.

Nature | Thinking | Time |

Václav Havel

The real test of a man is not how well he plays the role he has invented for himself, but how well he plays the role that destiny assigned to him.

Force | Man | Meaning | Nature |

Vannevar Bush

The scene changes but the aspirations of men of good will persist.

Body | Knowledge | Men | Nature | Responsibility | Understand |