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

Edwin Hubbell Chapin

There are interests by the sacrifice of which peace is too dearly purchased. One should never be at peace to the shame of his own soul - to the violation of his integrity or of his allegiance to God.

Character | God | Integrity | Peace | Sacrifice | Shame | Soul |

W. Macneile Dixon, fully William Macneile Dixon

The astonishing thing about him [man] is his range of vision; his gaze into the infinite distance; his lonely passion for ideas and ideals, far removed from his material surroundings and animal activities, and in no way suggested by them, yet for which, such is his affection, he is willing to endure toils and privations, to sacrifice pleasures, to disdain griefs and frustrations. The inner truth is that every man is himself a creator, by birth and nature, an artist, an architect and fashioner of worlds.

Birth | Character | Disdain | Ideals | Ideas | Man | Nature | Passion | Sacrifice | Truth | Vision |

Charles Du Bos

The important thing is this: to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.

Character | Important | Sacrifice |

James William Fulbright

Of all the animals on earth, man has shown himself to be the most cruel and brutal. He is the only animal that will create instruments of death for his own destruction. Man is the only animal on all the earth that has ever been known to burn its young as a sacrifice to appease the wrath of some imaginary deity. He is the only one that will build homes, towns, and cities at such a cost in sacrifice and suffering and turn around and destroy them in war.

Character | Cost | Death | Destroy | Earth | Man | Sacrifice | Suffering | War | Will |

O. P. Gifford

One never knows himself till he has denied himself. The altar of sacrifice is the touchstone of character.

Character | Sacrifice |

Chief Dan George

My friends, how desperately do we need to be loved and to love. When Christ said that man does not live by bread alone, he spoke of a hunger. This hunger was no the hunger of the body. It was not the hunger for bread. He spoke of a hunger that begins deep down in the very depths of our being. He spoke of a need as vital as breath. He spoke of our hunger for love. Love is something you and I must have. We must have it because our spirit feeds upon it. We must have it because without it we become weak and faint. Without love our self-esteem weakens. Without it our courage fails. Without love we can no longer look out confidently at the world. We turn inward and begin to feed upon our own personalities, and little by little we destroy ourselves. With it we are creative. With it we march tirelessly. With it, and with it alone, we are able to sacrifice for others.

Body | Character | Courage | Destroy | Esteem | Hunger | Little | Love | Man | Need | Sacrifice | Self | Self-esteem | Spirit | World |

Carl Holmes

A happy life is made up of little things in which smiles and small favors are given habitually. A gift sent, a letter written, a call made, a recommendation given, transportation provided, a cake made, a book lent, a check sent - things which are done without hesitation. Kindness isn't sacrifice so much as it is being considerate for the feelings of others, sharing happiness, the unselfish thought, the spontaneous and friendly act, forgetfulness of our own present interests.

Character | Feelings | Forgetfulness | Happy | Kindness | Life | Life | Little | Present | Sacrifice | Thought |

Yosef Y. Hurwitz

An honor-seeker is not really interested in self-improvement. He is only interested in gaining approval from others. Hence, he will disregard any fault he has if he knows that others will not notice it. On the other hand, a person who is able to forego his honor is able to focus on truth. His only thought is to do the right thing and he is willing to sacrifice his honor for his principles. Such a person will eventually receive honor, for he will constantly work on improving himself.

Character | Fault | Focus | Honor | Improvement | Principles | Receive | Right | Sacrifice | Self | Self-improvement | Thought | Truth | Will | Work | Approval | Fault | Thought |

M. Hulburd

Character is so largely affected by associations that we cannot afford to be indifferent as to who and what our friends are. They write their names in our albums, but they do more, they help make us what we are. Be therefore careful in selecting them; and when wisely selected, never sacrifice them.

Character | Sacrifice | Friends |

Søren Kierkegaard, fully Søren Aabye Kierkegaard

The God-relationship determines what love is between man and man, then love is kept from pausing in any self-deception or illusion, while certainly the demand for self-abnegation and sacrifice is again made more infinite. The love which does not lead to God, the love which does not have this as its sole goal, to lead the lovers to love God, stops at the purely human judgment as to what love and what love’s sacrifice and submission are; it stops and thereby escapes the possibility of the last and most terrifying horror of the collision: that in the love relationship there are infinite differences in the idea of what love is.

Character | God | Illusion | Judgment | Love | Man | Relationship | Sacrifice | Self | Self-deception | Submission |

Garrison Keillor, fully Gary Edward "Garrison" Keillor

The only moral virtue of war is that it compels the capitalist system to look itself in the face and admit it is a fraud. It compels the present society to admit that it has no morals it will not sacrifice for gain.

Character | Fraud | Present | Sacrifice | Society | System | Virtue | Virtue | War | Will | Society |

Joshua L. Liebman, fully Joshua Loth Liebman

Maturity is achieved when a person accepts life as full of tension; when he does not torment himself with childish guilt feelings, but avoids tragic adult sins; when he postpones immediate pleasures for the sake of long-term values... Our generation must be inspired to search for that maturity which will manifest itself in the qualities of tenacity, dependability, co-operativeness and the inner drive to work and sacrifice for a nobler future of mankind.

Character | Feelings | Future | Guilt | Life | Life | Mankind | Qualities | Sacrifice | Search | Tenacity | Will | Work |

James Russell Lowell

No man can produce great things who is not thoroughly sincere in dealing with himself, who would not exchange the finest show for the poorest reality, who does not so love his work that he is not only glad to give himself for it, but finds rather a gain than a sacrifice in the surrender.

Character | Love | Man | Reality | Sacrifice | Surrender | Work |

Yechezkail Levenstein

The commandment to love the Almighty requires that we should be willing to give up our lives if necessary out of love for Him. If a person has internalized that in reality he is a soul and his body is merely an outer garment that he temporarily wears, he will find it relatively easy to fulfill the commandment of giving up his life is need be. He does not feel as if he is sacrificing himself for he always retains his soul. His body which he is sacrificing is not himself but only an outer garment. For such a person giving up his life is not the ultimate sacrifice since his body is not an integral part of his identity.

Body | Character | Giving | Life | Life | Love | Need | Reality | Sacrifice | Soul | Will |

Maurice Nicoll

Man gains freedom only through the use of his highest faculties. Materialism makes him more and more a slave to the forces of the phenomenal world... Our present-day materialism points in this direction - that is, in the direction of the enslavement of man by mechanisation and by its direct results, by state organisations, uniformity, the sacrifice of independent intelligence, the sweeping away of individual differences, local customs, local diversity, and all the infinite branchings of humanity that enrich life... Man is made free by ‘truth’. The truth spoken here is equated with mind. This kind of truth begins with self-knowledge.

Character | Day | Diversity | Freedom | Humanity | Individual | Intelligence | Knowledge | Life | Life | Man | Materialism | Mind | Present | Sacrifice | Self | Self-knowledge | Truth | Uniformity | World |

Albert Schweitzer

Whatever you have received more than others - in health, in talents, in ability, in success, in a pleasant childhood, in harmonious conditions of home life - all this you must not take to yourself as a matter of course. In gratitude for your good fortune, you must render in return some sacrifice of your own life for another life.

Ability | Character | Childhood | Fortune | Good | Gratitude | Health | Life | Life | Sacrifice | Success |

Mary Warnock, fully Helen Mary Warnock, Baroness Warnock

If choosing freely for oneself is the highest value, the free choice to wear red socks is as valuable as the free choice to murder one’s father or sacrifice oneself for one’s friend. Such a belief is ridiculous.

Belief | Character | Choice | Father | Free choice | Friend | Murder | Sacrifice | Murder |