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

Elizabeth Bowen, Full name Elizabeth Dorothea Cole Bowen

She walked about with the rather fated expression you see in photographs of girls who have subsequently been murdered, but nothing had so far happened to her.

Need | Thought | Worry | Thought |

William Shakespeare

Ram thou fruitful tidings in mine ears, that long time have been barren.

Men | Need | Taste |

Eleanor Holmes Norton

You can't whip folks into line on statehood like you can on a budget vote. People have to believe in your cause.

Children | Giving | Good | Need | Public | Thinking |

Elias L. Magoon

Child of earth and earthly sorrows--child of God and immortal hopes--arise from thy sadness, gird up the loins of thy mind, and with unfaltering energy press toward thy rest and reward on high.

Need | Order | Rhetoric |

Elif Safak

How do you name him? - Asked his wife, when she proudly showed blocks. Gentle sea breeze wafted the aroma of jasmine and floated between them. From the lips of Pavel Pavlovich Antipov fell off explaining that she could not say: - Agrippina, this is your baby, whose eyes were the color of ash. I will always love you, but I will not expect more than you can give him. Will be the sole and only you, but would not want to devote him. Never claim will not cry, I will not get sick and not die. Did not grow. If you do not leave, and it will not let you down. Will be called as you want. How would you call it?

Challenge | Good | Love | Need |

Elif Safak

I slept peacefully that night, feeling exultant and determined. Little did I know that I was making the most common and the most painful mistake women have made all throughout the ages: to naively think that with their love they can change the man they love.

Devil | Focus | Need | Think |

Elihu Root

The point of departure of the process to which we wish to contribute is the fact that war is the natural reaction of human nature in the savage state, while peace is the result of acquired characteristics.

Mother | System | Old |

William Shakespeare

Silence is not a language, it’s a weapon to make your dear one to feel.

Need | Time |

Elizabeth Gilbert

I thought of how many people go to their graves unforgiven and unforgiving. I thought of how many people have had siblings or friends or children or lovers disappear from their lives before precious words of clemency or absolution could be passed along. How do the survivors of terminated relationships ever endure the pain of unfinished business?

Earth | Need | Thought | Thought |

Elizabeth Gilbert

He was powerful and I died of love in his shadow.

Character | Need |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Dear me, how I love a library.

Forgiveness | Need | Forgiveness | Understand |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has now become repulsed by you. He looks at you like you're someone he's never met before, much less someone he once loved with high passion. The irony is, you can hardly blame him. I mean, check yourself out. You're a pathetic mess, unrecognizable even to your own eyes.

Need | Pain | Pleasure |

Elizabeth Gilbert

By unnerving definition, anything that the heart has chosen for its own mysterious reasons it can always unchoose later—again, for its own mysterious reasons.

Care | Credit | Justification | Learning | Need | Pleasure | Right |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Here’s another example of the difference in our worldviews. A family in my sister’s neighborhood was recently stricken with a double tragedy, when both the young mother and her three-year-old son were diagnosed with cancer. When Catherine told me about this, I could only say, shocked, Dear God, that family needs grace. She replied firmly, That family needs casseroles, and then proceeded to organize the entire neighborhood into bringing that family dinner, in shifts, every single night, for an entire year. I do not know if my sister fully recognizes that this is grace.

Husband | Need | Order | Wife | Will |

Elizabeth Gilbert

I don't believe in magic, but I do believe in interpreting coincidence exactly the way you want

Love | Need |

Elizabeth Gilbert

I’m not laughing. I was actually crying. And please don’t laugh at me now, but I think the reason it’s so hard for me to get over this guy is because I seriously believed David was my soul mate. He probably was. Your problem is you don’t understand what that word means. People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then they leave. And thank God for it. Your problem is, you just can’t let this one go. It’s over, Groceries. David’s purpose was to shake you up, drive you out of your marriage that you needed to leave, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light could get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you had to transform your life, then introduce you to your spiritual master and beat it. That was his job, and he did great, but now it’s over. Problem is, you can’t accept that his relationship had a real short shelf life. You’re like a dog at the dump, baby – you’re just lickin’ at the empty tin can, trying to get more nutrition out of it. And if you’re not careful, that can’s gonna get stuck on your snout forever and make your life miserable. So drop it.But I love him. So love him. But I miss him. So miss him. Send him some love and light every time you think about him, then drop it. You’re just afraid to let go of the last bits of David because then you’ll be really alone, and Liz Gilbert is scared to death of what will happen if she’s really alone. But here’s what you gotta understand, Groceries. If you clear out all that space in your mind that you’re using right now to obsess about this guy, you’ll have a vacuum there, an open spot – a doorway. And guess what the universe will do with the doorway? It will rush in – God will rush in – and fill you with more love than you ever dreamed. So stop using David to block that door. Let it go.

Care | Death | Depression | Loneliness | Love | Need | Nothing | Will |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Creative people always suffer from depression because we're so super sensitive and special?

Challenge | Comfort | Enough | Humanity | Means | Money | Need | People | Pleasure | Search | Skill | System | Time | Will | World |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Desiring another person is perhaps the most risky endeavor of all. As soon as you want somebody—really want him—it is as though you have taken a surgical needle and sutured your happiness to the skin of that person, so that any separation will now cause a lacerating injury.

Loneliness | Need |

Elizabeth Gilbert

Guilt's just your ego's way of tricking you into thinking that you're making moral progress. Don't fall for it, my dear.

Control | Life | Life | Need | Power | Work | Trouble | Learn |

Elizabeth Gilbert

I'm choosing happiness over suffering, I know I am. I'm making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises.

Accomplishment | Beauty | Experience | Means | Need | Nothing | Order | Beauty |