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

Russell Baker. fully Russell Wayne Baker

The Government cannot afford to have a country made up entirely of rich people, because rich people pay so little tax that the Government would quickly go bankrupt. This is why Government men always tell us that labor is man's noblest calling. Government needs labor to pay its upkeep.

Defeat | Man |

Saki, pen name for Hector Hugh Munro or H.H. Munro NULL

Think how many blameless lives are brightened by the blazing indiscretions of other people.

Nothing | Old |

Sallust, full name Carus Valerius Sailustius Crispus NULL

It is a law of human nature that in victory even the coward may boast of his prowess, while defeat injures the reputation even of the brave.

Defeat |

Sam Ervin, fully Samuel James "Sam" Ervin, Jr.

When religion controls government, political liberty dies; and when government controls religion, religious liberty perishes.

Change | Government | Mind | Surrender | Government |

Samuel Gompers

At the outset, I want to say that the organized labor movement of America is not a know-nothing organization. It does not want to erect a wall around the borders of our country and keep everybody else out; it does not declare America for Americans, or for those who are now within American borders. But on the other hand it is equally true that the thinking workingmen of the United States have . . . come to the conclusion that there must be some better regulation and some limitation.

Defeat | Improvement | Love | Order | Position | Question | Sentiment | Will | Friends |

Samuel Gompers

It may be, as you say, the enforced demand for the closed (union) shop is one of the greatest stumbling blocks in the way of industrial peace. But the fact back of this fact . . . is that the trade union is not formed for peace. It is organized for protection -- with peace, of course, where possible. But peace, only, may be death.

Defeat | Fear | God | Labor | Men | Will | God |

Simón Bolívar, fully Simón José Antonio de la Santísima Trinidad Bolívar y Palacios Ponte y Blanco

The continuation of authority has frequently proved the undoing of democratic governments. Repeated elections are essential to the system of popular governments, because there is nothing so dangerous as to suffer power to be vested for a long time in one citizen. The people become accustomed to obeying him, and he becomes accustomed to commanding, hence the origin of usurpation and tyranny.

Art | Art |

Simone Weil

It is only necessary to know that love is a direction and not a state of the soul. If one is unaware of this, one falls to despair at the first onslaught of affliction.

Cause | Men | Order |

Simón Bolívar, fully Simón José Antonio de la Santísima Trinidad Bolívar y Palacios Ponte y Blanco

Flee the country where a lone man holds all power: It is a nation of slaves.

God | Spirit | God |

Simon Wiesenthal

The schools would fail through their silence, the Church through its forgiveness, and the home through the denial and silence of the parents. The new generation has to hear what the older generation refuses to tell it.

Crime | Decision | History |

Simón Bolívar, fully Simón José Antonio de la Santísima Trinidad Bolívar y Palacios Ponte y Blanco

I swear before you; I swear on the God of my parents; I swear on them; I swear on my honor and I swear on my country that I shall not give rest to my arm nor respite to my soul until I have broken the chains that oppress us by the will of the Spanish power.

Simone Weil

Whatever debases the intelligence degrades the entire human being.

Capacity | Cause | Defeat | Giving | Good | Impression | Meaning | Nations | Opposition | Politics | Purpose | Purpose | Security | War |

Simone de Beauvoir, fully Simone-Ernestine-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir

I'm never afraid. But in my case it's nothing to be proud of.

Arthur Conan Doyle, fully Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle

Indeed, I cannot think why the whole bed of the ocean is not one solid mass of oysters, so prolific the creatures seem. Ah, I am wandering! Strange how the brain controls the brain! What was I saying, Watson?

Defeat | Understand |

Pope Leo I, aka Pope Leo The Great, Pope Saint Leo I NULL

Word in our flesh, Wisdom in infancy, Power in weakness, and in true Man, the Lord of Majesty.

Nothing | Trial |

John Climacus, fully Saint John Climacus, aka John of the Ladder, John Scholasticus and John Sinaites

Someone told me of an extraordinarily high degree of purity. He said: A certain man, on seeing a beautiful woman, thereupon glorified the Creator; and from that one look, he was moved to the love of God and to a fountain of tears. And it was wonderful to see how what would have been a cause of destruction for one was for another the supernatural cause of a crown. If such person always feels and behaves in the same way on similar occasions, then he has risen immortal before the general resurrection.

Defeat | Force | Men | Nature | Opinion | Power | Wealth |

Stephan Jay Gould

Details are all that matters: God dwells there, and you never get to see Him if you don't struggle to get them right.

Art | Day | Discovery | Good | Nothing | Position | Discovery | Trial | Art | Think | Winning |

Stephane Mallarme, born Étienne Mallarmé

Gender named literature simply fun hair.

Agony | Art | Contempt | Eternal | Genius | Heaven | Irony | Looks | Lying | Man | Remorse | Sin | Art | Old |

Stefan Zweig

Anyone who has ever found himself, cannot lose in this world anymore.

Brutality | Defeat | Reason | Witness |