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

Ezra Taft Benson

The United States Constitution has been in existence longer than any written constitution in history. It has been a blessing, not only to our land, but to the world as well. Many nations have wisely adopted concepts and provisions of our Constitution, just as was prophesied.

Atheism | Children | Civilization | Education | Government | Public | Right | System | Will | World | Government |

Ezra Taft Benson

We must not be cast down or discouraged in this work. There is no basis for discouragement. We are not alone. We will not, we cannot fail if we will do our duty. The Lord will magnify us even beyond our present talents and abilities.

Authority | Better | Blessings | Confidence | Devotion | God | Honor | Law | Little | Lord | Man | Nature | Principles | Tradition | Trust | Will | Wisdom | Wise | God |

Felix Adler

Ethical religion affirms the continuity of progress toward moral perfection. It affirms that the spiritual development of the human race cannot be prematurely cut off, either gradually or suddenly; that every stone of offence against which we stumble is a stepping-stone to some greater good ; that, at the end of days, if we choose to put it so, or, rather, in some sphere beyond the world of space and time, all the rays of progress will be summed and centred in a transcendent focus.

Convictions | Man |

Ezra Taft Benson

It’s a great blessing to live in America. It’s a great blessing to have the opportunity to enjoy the freedoms which are ours today. I have seen people, thousands of them, who have lost the freedom which is ours, where they can no longer meet, as we meet here this morning, and express themselves as they see fit, where they no longer have freedom of movement, freedom to select their own jobs, their own educational opportunities, freedom to speak their minds, to write what they wish – freedom of enterprise. In many parts of the world today these rich blessings of freedom no longer exist.

Blessings | Destiny | Dignity | Eternal | Family | Glory | Law | Lord | Receive | Time | Wife |

Ezra Taft Benson

In the 1940s while serving as the executive officer of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives in Washington, D.C., I saw in a Hilton Hotel a placard depicting Uncle Sam, representing America, on his knees in humility and prayer. Beneath the placard was the inscription, "Not beaten there by the hammer and sickle, but freely, responsibly, confidently. . . We need fear nothing or no one save God." That picture has stayed in my memory ever since; America on her knees in recognition that all our blessings come from God! America on her knees out of a desire to serve the God of this land by keeping his commandments! America on her knees, not driven there in capitulation to some despotic government, but on her knees freely, willingly, gratefully! This is the sovereign remedy to all of our problems and the preservation of our liberties.

Authority | Giving | God | Law | Man | People | Pious | Reflection | Work | God |

Ezra Pound, fully Ezra Weston Loomis Pound

Nothing matter but the quality of the affection—in the end—that has carved the trace in the mind dove sta memoria.

Good | Man | Wants |

Faith Popcorn, born Faith Plotkin

It's a teeny, tiny brain chip that's inserted at will... (that) will give you language (skills or other) knowledge,

History | Time |

Felix Adler

If you desire information on some point of law, you are not likely to ponder over the ponderous tomes of legal writers in order to obtain the knowledge you seek, by your own unaided efforts.

Excellence | Law | Man | Order | Qualities | Righteousness | Universe | Will | Excellence |

Ezra Taft Benson

It must be remembered that the founding fathers of this great nation were men imbued with these principles [the Ten Commandments]. There are those in the land whose faith it is that these were “wise men whom [God] raised up” for the purpose of establishing the Constitution of the United States. They recognized that there are two possible sources to the origin of our freedoms that we have come to know as human rights. Rights are either God-given as part of a divine plan or they are granted as part of the political plan. Reason, necessity, and religious conviction and belief in the sovereignty of God led these men to accept the divine origin of these rights. To God’s glory and the credit of these men, our nation was uniquely born.

Man |

Ezra Taft Benson

You must keep your honor. You cannot yet speak officially for the country, but you can become informed. You can speak your mind. You may think you can do little about the national economy or the actions of our government and the moral weakness all about us, but we must all remember that the Lord has placed great responsibilities upon the elders of Israel in the preservation of our Constitution.

Body | Inspiration | Men | Mind | Time |

Ezra Pound, fully Ezra Weston Loomis Pound

Modern civilization has bred a race with brains like those of rabbits and we who are the heirs of the witch-doctor and the voodoo. We artists who have been so long the despised are about to take over control.

Books | Man | Understand |

Feisal Abdul Rauf

I read, read enormously on all different fields of Islamic thought, from philosophy to Islamic literature, poetry, exegeses, knowledge of the Hadith, the teachings of the prophet. That's how I trained myself. And then I was appointed imam by a Sufi master from Istanbul, Turkey.

Man |

Felix Adler

It is written that the last enemy to be vanquished is death. We should begin early in life to vanquish this enemy by obliterating every trace of the fear of death from our minds.

Law | Man | Need |

Ezra Taft Benson

If there is one word that describes the meaning of character, it is the word honor. Without honor, civilization would not long exist. Without honor, there could be no dependable contracts, no lasting marriages, no trust or happiness. What does the word honor mean to you? To me, honor is summarized in this expression by the poet Tennyson, "Man's word [of honor] is God in man."

Behavior | Control | Man | Victim |

Felix Adler

The right for the right's sake is the motto which everyone should take for his own life. With that as a standard of value we can descend into our hearts, appraise ourselves, and determine in how far we already are moral beings, in how far not yet.

Future | Indispensable | Individual | Service | Time | Will |

Felix Adler

The Supreme Ethical Rule: Act So As To Elicit the Best In Others and Thereby In Thy Self. Always act so as to elicit the best in others, and thereby oneself. Always act so as to elicit the best in others, and thereby one's Self. Always act so as to elicit the best in others, and thereby in yourself. Act so as to encourage the best in others and by so doing you will develop the best in yourself.

Right | Value |

Felix Adler

The platform of an Ethical Society is itself the altar; the address must be the fire that burns thereon.

Contrast | Life | Life | Love | Mortal | Pain | Peace | Sense | Thought | Time | Understanding | Thought |

Felix Adler

There is a great and crying evil in modern society. It is want of purpose. It is that narrowness of vision which shuts out the wider vistas of the soul. It is the absence of those sublime emotions which, wherever they arise, do not fall to exalt and consecrate existence.

Difficulty | Heart | Influence | Meaning | Men | Right | Understand |

Felix Adler

Theologians often say that faith must come first, and that morality must be deduced from faith. We say that morality must come first, and faith, to those whose nature fits them to entertain it, will come out of the experience of a deepened moral life as its richest, choicest fruit. Precisely because moral culture is the aim, we cannot be content merely to lift the mass of mankind above the grosser forms of evil. We must try to advance the cause of humanity by developing in ourselves, as well as in others, a higher type of manhood and womanhood than the past has known. To aid in the evolution of a new conscience, to inject living streams of moral force into the dry veins of materialistic communities is our aim. We seek to come into touch with the ultimate power in things, the ultimate peace in things, which yet, in any literal sense, we know well that we cannot know. We seek to become morally certain — that is, certain for moral purposes — of what is beyond the reach of demonstration. But our moral optimism must include the darkest facts that pessimism can point to, include them and transcend them.

Children | Future | Happy | Light | Past | Time | Truth | Will | Work | World |

Felix Adler

There is a city to be built, the plan of which we carry in our heads, in our hearts. Countless generations have already toiled at the building of it. The effort to aid in completing it, with us, takes the place of prayer. In this sense we say, "Laborare est orare."

Daring | Life | Life | Man | Men | Present | Righteousness | Search | Theories | Thinkers | Thought | Time | Truth | Unity | Will | Woman | World | Youth | Youth | Learn | Thought |