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

George Farquhar

Women never really command until they have given their promise to obey; and they are never in more danger of being made slaves than when the men are at their feet.

Character | Danger | Men | Promise | Danger |

Patrick Joseph Hayes

Be charitable in your thoughts, in your speech and in your actions. Be charitable in your judgments, in your attitudes and in your prayers. Think charitably of your friends, your neighbors, your relatives and even your enemies. And if there be those whom you can help in a material way, do so in a quiet, friendly, neighborly way, as if it were the most command and everyday experience for you. Tongues of men and angels, gifts of prophecy and all mysteries and all knowledge are as nothing without charity.

Angels | Character | Charity | Experience | Knowledge | Men | Nothing | Prophecy | Quiet | Speech | Think |

Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

He who establishes his argument by noise and command shows that reason is weak.

Argument | Character | Noise | Reason |

Austin Phelps

Vigilance in watching opportunity; tact and daring in seizing upon opportunity; force and persistence in crowding opportunity to its utmost possible achievement - these are the martial virtues which must command success.

Achievement | Character | Daring | Force | Opportunity | Persistence | Success | Tact | Vigilance |

Samuel Smiles

The crown and glory of life is character. It is the noblest possession of a man, constituting a rank in itself, and estate in the general good will; dignifying every station, and exacting every position in society. It exercises a greater power than wealth and secures all the honor without the jealousies of fame. It carries with it an influence which always tells; for it is the result of proved honor, rectitude and consistency - qualities which, perhaps more than any others, command the general confidence and respect of mankind.

Character | Confidence | Consistency | Fame | Glory | Good | Honor | Influence | Life | Life | Man | Mankind | Position | Power | Qualities | Rank | Respect | Society | Wealth | Will | Respect |

Paul Tyner

Man is to know himself, and with full command of his conditions and unlimited time for action, is not only to soar toward, but absolutely attain to heights of being and of beauty hitherto undreamed of, and bringing fairly within his realization a heaven on earth, in true grandeur and happiness as far transcending the heaven of the orthodox Christian as that heaven transcends the heaven of the savage.

Action | Beauty | Character | Earth | Heaven | Man | Time | Beauty | Happiness |

Paul Tyner

The absolute demonstration of man’s mastery of fate and command of all condition - the victory of man - all men in this racial man, this elder brother of mankind in his triumph over sin, fear and death! But one thing had remained in my mind as necessary to prove to the mass of men to-day man’s absolute supremacy over death in all its forms as an attribute of his oneness with God, with Eternal Life, Perfect Love, Perfect Justice, Omniscience and Omnipotence.

Absolute | Character | Day | Death | Eternal | Fate | Fear | God | Justice | Life | Life | Love | Man | Mankind | Men | Mind | Omnipotence | Omniscience | Oneness | Sin | Fate |

Aubrey de Vere, fully Aubrey Albericus de Vere NULL

Grief should be like joy, majestic, sedate, confirming, cleansing, equable, making free, strong to consume small troubles, to command great thoughts, grave thoughts, thoughts lasting to the end.

Character | Grave | Grief | Joy | Troubles |

Saint Augustine, aka Augustine of Hippo, St. Austin, Bishop of Hippo NULL

It is with the desire for peace that wars are waged, even by those who take pleasure in exercising their warlike nature in command and battle. And hence it is obvious that peace is the end sought for by war. For every man seeks peace by waging war, but no man seeks war by making peace... Even wicked men wage war to maintain the peace of their own circle, and wish that, if possible, all men belonged to them, that all men and things might serve but one head, and might, either through love or fear, yield themselves to peace with him!

Battle | Desire | Fear | Love | Man | Men | Nature | Peace | Pleasure | War | Wisdom |

Big Elk, aka Ontopanga NULL

Do not grieve. Misfortunes will happen to the wisest and best of men. Death will come, always out of season. It is the command of the Great Spirit, and all nations and people must obey. What is past and what cannot be prevented should not be grieved for... Misfortunes do not flourish particularly in our lives - they grow everywhere.

Death | Men | Nations | Past | People | Spirit | Will | Wisdom |

Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton

Power is so characteristically calm that calmness in itself has the aspect of power, and forbearance implies strength. The orator who is known to have at his command all the weapons of invective is most formidable when most courteous.

Calmness | Forbearance | Power | Strength | Weapons | Wisdom |

Theodore Cuyler, fully Theodore Ledyard Cuyler

It is the easiest thing in the world for us to obey God when He command us to do what we like, and to trust Him when the path is all sunshine. The real victory of faith is to trust God in the dark, and through the dark. Let us be assured of this, that if the lesson and the rod are of His appointing, and that His all-wise love has engineered the deep tunnel of trial on the heavenward road, He will never desert us during the discipline. The vital thing for us is not to deny and desert Him.

Discipline | Faith | God | Lesson | Love | Trust | Will | Wisdom | Wise | World | Trial | God |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

He only is happy as well as great who needs neither to obey nor command in order to be something.

Happy | Order | Wisdom |

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The use of a thing is only a part of its significance. To know anything thoroughly, to have the full command of it in all its appliances, we must study it on its own account, independently of any special application.

Study | Wisdom |

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Whether a man accepts from fortune her spade and will look downward and dig, or from aspiration her axe and cord, and will scale the ice, the one and only success which it is his to command is to bring to his work a mighty heart.

Aspiration | Fortune | Heart | Man | Success | Will | Wisdom | Work | Aspiration |

John F. Kennedy, fully John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy

A police state finds it cannot command the grain to grow.

Wisdom |

Baron de Montesquieu, fully Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu

The principle of democracy is corrupted not only when the spirit of equality is extinct, but likewise when they fall into a spirit of extreme equality, and when each citizen would fain to be upon a level with those whom he has chosen to command him. Then the people, incapable of bearing the very power they have delegated, want to manage everything themselves, to debate for the senate, to execute for the magistrate, and to decide for the judges.

Democracy | Equality | Extreme | People | Power | Spirit | Wisdom |