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

Louis-Aimé Martin

It requires two indiscreet persons to institute a quarrel; one individual cannot quarrel alone.

Character | Individual |

Boethius, fully Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius NULL

Whose happiness is so firmly established that he has no quarrel from any side with his estate of life?

Character | Life | Life | Happiness |

Daniel Webster

Falsehoods not only disagree with truths, but usually quarrel among themselves.

Character | Wisdom |

G. K. Chesterton, fully Gilbert Keith Chesterton

People generally quarrel because they cannot argue.

People | Wisdom |

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, fully Sir or Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan

Once upon a time, Buddha relates, a certain king of Benares, desiring to divert himself, gathered together a number of beggars blind from birth and offered a prize to the one who should give him the best account of an elephant. The first beggar who examined the elephant chanced to lay hold of a leg, and reported that an elephant was a tree-trunk; the second, laying hold of the tail, declared that an elephant was like a rope; another, who seized an ear, insisted that an elephant was like a palm-leaf; and so on. The beggars fell to quarrelling with one another, and the king was greatly amused. Ordinary teachers who have grasped this or that aspect of truth quarrel with one another, while only a Buddha knows the whole.

Birth | Time | Truth |

Red Jacket, aka Sagoyewatha NULL

We are told that your religion was given to your forefathers and has been handed down from father to son. We also have a religion which was given to our forefathers and has been handed down to us, their children. We worship in that way. It teaches us to be thankful for all the favors we receive, to love each other, and to be united. We never quarrel about religion.

Children | Father | Love | Receive | Religion | Worship |

Blaise Pascal

Can anything be more ridiculous than that a man should have the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of the water, and because his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have none with him?

Kill | Man | Right |

Charles Caleb Colton

In most quarrels there is fault on both sides. A quarrel may be compared to a spark, which cannot be produced without a flint as well as steel. Either of them may hammer on wood forever; no fire will follow.

Fault | Will | Fault |

Chief Joseph, born Hinmuuttu-yalatlat

We do not want churches because they will teach us to quarrel about God, as the Catholics and Protestants do. We do not want to learn that. We may quarrel with men sometimes about things on earth. But we never quarrel about God. We do not want to learn that.

Earth | God | Men | Teach | Will | Learn |

Chief Joseph, born Hinmuuttu-yalatlat

We do not want churches. They will teach us to quarrel about God.

God | Teach | Will |

Abraham Joshua Heschel

Gloom’s roots are in pretentiousness, fastidiousness, and a disregard of the good. The gloomy man, living in irritation and a constant quarrel with his destiny, senses hostility everywhere and seems never to be aware of the illegitimacy of his own complaints. He has a fine sense for the incongruities of life but stubbornly refuses to recognize the delicate grace of existence.

Grace | Life | Life | Sense |

Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze

He does not quarrel therefore no one in the world can quarrel with him.

World |

Plato NULL

If we mean our future guardians to regard the habit of quarrelling among themselves as of all things the basest, should any word be said to them of the wars in heaven, and of the plots and fightings of the gods against one another, for they are not true. No, we shall never mention the battles of the giants, or let them be embroidered on garments; and we shall be silent about the innumerable other quarrels of gods and heroes with their friends and relatives. If they would only believe us we would tell them that quarrelling is unholy, and that never up to this time has there been any quarrel between citizens; this is what old men and old women should being by telling children; and when they grow up, the poets also should be told to compose for them in a similar spirit.

Future | Habit | Men | Regard | Time | Friends | Old |

Albert Einstein

In essence, the conflict that exists today is no more than an old-style struggle for power, once again presented to mankind in semi religious trappings. The difference is that, this time, the development of atomic power has imbued the struggle with a ghostly character; for both parties know and admit that, should the quarrel deteriorate into actual war, mankind is doomed. Despite this knowledge, statesmen in responsible positions on both sides continue to employ the well-known technique of seeking to intimidate and demoralize the opponent by marshaling superior military strength. They do so even though such a policy entails the risk of war and doom. Not one statesman in a position of responsibility has dared to pursue the only course that holds out any promise of peace, the course of supranational security, since for a statesman to follow such a course would be tantamount to political suicide. Political passions, once they have been fanned into flame, exact their victims… [These were his last words]

Mankind | Policy | Position | Power | Promise | Responsibility | Risk | Struggle | War |

Albert Einstein

The conflict that exists today is no more than an old-style struggle for power, once again presented to mankind in semireligious trappings. The difference is that, this time, the development of atomic power has imbued the struggle with a ghostly character; for both parties know and admit that, should the quarrel deteriorate into actual war, mankind is doomed.

Mankind | Power | Struggle |

Ramakrishna, aka Ramakrishna Paramhamsa or Sri Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay NULL

Four blind men went to see an elephant. One touched the leg of the elephant, and said, The elephant is like a pillar. The second touched the trunk, and said, The elephant is like a thick stick or club. The third touched the belly, and said, The elephant is like a big jar. The fourth touched the ears, and said, The elephant is like a winnowing basket. Thus they began to dispute amongst themselves as to the figure of the elephant. A passer-by seeing them thus quarrelling, said, What is it that you are disputing about? They told him everything, and asked him to arbitrate. That man said, None of you has seen the elephant. The elephant is not like a pillar, its legs are like pillars. It is not like a big water-vessel, its belly is like a water-vessel. It is not like a winnowing basket, its ears are like winnowing baskets. It is not like a thick stick or club, but its proboscis is like that. The elephant is the combination of all these. In the same manner those quarrel who have seen one aspect only of the Deity.

Dispute | Man | Men |