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

Charles de Gaulle, fully Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle

Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back on himself.

Character | Man |

Madame Deluzy, Luzy Dorothee

Heartlessness and fascination, in about equal quantities, constitute the receipt for forming the character of coquette.

Character |

Albert Einstein

Exaggerated respect for athletics, an excess of coarse impressions brought about by the technical discoveries of recent years, the increased severity of the struggle for existence due to the economic crisis, the brutalization of political life: all these factors are hostile to the ripening of the character and the desire for real culture, and stamp our age as barbarous, materialistic and superficial.

Age | Athletics | Character | Culture | Desire | Excess | Existence | Life | Life | Respect | Struggle | Respect |

Tyron Edwards

Thoughts lead on to purposes; purposes go forth in action; actions form habits; habits decide character; and character fixes our destiny.

Action | Character | Destiny | Wisdom |

Tyron Edwards

To murder character is as truly a crime as to murder the body: the tongue of the slanderer is brother to the dagger of the assassin.

Body | Character | Crime | Murder | Murder |

J. L. M. Curry, fully Jabez Lamar Monroe Curry

A state to prosper, must be built on foundations of moral character, and, this character is the principal element of its strength, and the only guaranty of its permanence and prosperity.

Character | Prosperity | Strength |

Euripedes NULL

Many are the natures of men, various their manners of living, yet a straight path is always the right one; and lessons deeply taught lead man to paths of righteousness; reverence, I say, is wisdom and by its grace transfigures - so that we seek virtue with a right judgment. From all of this springs honor bringing ageless glory into Man’s life. Oh, a mighty quest is the hunting out of virtue.

Character | Glory | Grace | Honor | Judgment | Life | Life | Man | Manners | Men | Reverence | Right | Righteousness | Virtue | Virtue | Wisdom |

Ilya Ehrenburg, fully Ilya Grigoryevich Ehrenburg

Knowledge has outstripped character development, and the young today are given an education rather than an upbringing.

Character | Education | Knowledge |

Dubner Magid, name for Rabbi Jacob ben wolf Krantz

It is a wise man’s good sense to be slow to anger, and his glory to pass over a transgression.

Anger | Character | Glory | Good | Man | Sense | Wise |

Tyron Edwards

The influences of little things are as real, and as constantly about us, as the air we breathe or the light by which we see. These are the small - the often invisible - the almost unthought of strands, which are inweaving and twisting by millions, to bind us to character - to good or evil here, and to heaven or hell hereafter.

Character | Evil | Good | Heaven | Hell | Light | Little |

Edicts of Ashoka NULL

He who does reverence to his own sect, while disparaging the sects of others wholly from attachment to his own, with intent to enhance the glory of his own sect, in reality by such conduct inflicts the severest injury on his own sect. Concord therefore is meritorious, to wit, hearkening and hearkening willingly to the Law of Piety, as accepted by other people.

Character | Conduct | Glory | Law | People | Piety | Reality | Reverence | Wit |

John Clayton Gifford

One man can completely change the character of a country, and the industry of its people, but dropping a single seed in fertile soil.

Change | Character | Industry | Man | People |

Benjamin Franklin

Education begins with life. Before we are aware the foundations of character are laid, and subsequent teaching avails but little to remove or alter them... If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.

Character | Education | Knowledge | Life | Life | Little | Man |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Nothing serves better to illustrate a man’s character than the things which he finds ridiculous. the ridiculous arises from a moral contrast which is innocently placed before the senses. The sensual man will often laugh when there is nothing to laugh at. Whatever it may be that moves him, he will always reveal the fact that he is pleased with himself.

Better | Character | Contrast | Man | Nothing | Will |

James T. Farrell, fully James Thomas Farrell

When a man thinks he is reading the character of another, he is often unconsciously betraying his own.

Character | Man | Reading |

Arland Gilbert

What a man accomplishes in a day depends upon the way in which he approaches his tasks. When we accept tough jobs as a challenge to our ability and wade into them with joy and enthusiasm miracles can happen. When we do our work with a dynamic conquering spirit we get things done.

Ability | Challenge | Character | Day | Dynamic | Enthusiasm | Joy | Man | Miracles | Spirit | Work |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The deed is everything, the glory naught.

Character | Glory |

John Cunningham Geikie

Our character is but the stamp on our souls of the free choices of good and evil we have made through life.

Character | Evil | Good | Life | Life |