Great Throughts Treasury

"A person can be expected to act responsibly only if he has responsibility. This is human nature. So let us encourage individuals at home and nations abroad to do more for themselves, to decide more for themselves. Let us locate responsibility in more places." - Richard Nixon, fully Richard Milhous Nixon

"It's the responsibility of the media to look at the president with a microscope, but they go too far when they use a proctoscope." - Richard Nixon, fully Richard Milhous Nixon

"Just as we respect the right of each nation to determine its own future, we also recognize the responsibility of each nation to secure its own future." - Richard Nixon, fully Richard Milhous Nixon

"The average American is just like the child in the family. You give him some responsibility and he is going to amount to something. He is going to do something. If, on the other hand, you make him completely dependent and pamper him and cater to him too much, you are going to make him soft, spoiled and eventually a very weak individual." - Richard Nixon, fully Richard Milhous Nixon

"I believe that it is my responsibility as the prime minister of Israel to do whatever can be done to exploit the unique opportunities that lie ahead of us to move towards peace. Not everything can be done by one act. " - Yitzhak Shamir, born Icchak Jaziernicki

"eight keys or ways you can build a more intimate and mutually fulfilling heart-to-heart relationship: 1. Seek to become a really good heart-centered listener. 2. Share gratitude and heartfelt appreciation. 3. Small kindnesses reap large dividends. 4. Keep your agreements. 5. Take responsibility for your own upset. 6. Celebrate your own and each other's successes. 7. Resist the urge to complain about your partner with your friends or family. 8. Develop and maintain supportive and mutually agreed upon ground rules and guidelines. And now, here are an additional four keys we've found that work wonders: 1. Be willing to give up personal space. 2. Prize your partner. 3. Touch with love. 4. Your job is not to fix, change, manipulate, or control your partner -- your job is to love them. " - Ron and Mary Hulnick, formally H. Ronald Hulnick and

"At all costs we must re-establish faith in spiritual values. We must worship something beyond ourselves, lest we destroy ourselves." - Philip Gibbs, fully Sir Philip Gibbs

"Government is the people's business and every man, woman and child becomes a shareholder with the first penny of tax paid." - Ronald Reagan, fully Ronald Wilson Reagan

"A leader who pushes the authority figure in an attempt to solve important problems should expect the authority figure to strike back, not necessarily from personal motivations but form the community’s pressure on him to maintain equilibrium." - Ronald A. Heifetz

"Crises provide authority figures with more power because people look to them to provide resolution." - Ronald A. Heifetz

"The flight to authority is particularly dangerous for at least two reasons: first, because the work avoidance often occurs in response to our biggest problems and, second, because it disables some of our most important personal and collective resources for accomplishing adaptive work." - Ronald A. Heifetz

"The myth of leadership is the myth of the lone warrior; the solitary individual whose heroism and brilliance enable him to lead the way." - Ronald A. Heifetz

"When [Gandhi] fasted for justice, people began to pay attention, not because another person was about to die of starvation but because Gandhi practiced what he preached." - Ronald A. Heifetz

"Our task is to educate the human being in such a way that he or she can bring to expression in the right way that which is living in the whole human being, and on the other side that which puts him/her into the world in the right way." - Rudolf Steiner, fully Rudolf Joseph Lorenz Steiner

"In the final analysis, virtue is not found in extremes, but in prudence." - Saint Vincent de Paul

"If the many allegations made to this date are true, then the burglars who broke into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate were, in effect, breaking into the home of every citizen." - Sam Ervin, fully Samuel James "Sam" Ervin, Jr.

"Let the slogan go forth that we will stand by our friends and administer a stinging rebuke to men or parties who are either indifferent, negligent, or hostile." - Samuel Gompers

"The birthplace of success for each person is in his Inner-Consciousness. The Inner-Consciousness will use whatever it is given. If constructive thoughts are planted positive outcomes will be the result. Plant the seeds of failure and failure will follow. And since the only real freedom a person has is the choice of what thoughts he will feed to his Inner-Consciousness he is totally responsible for the outcomes he gets." - Sidney Madwed

"Legislators, priests, philosophers, writers, and scientists have striven to show that the subordinate position of woman is willed in heaven and advantageous on earth." - Simone de Beauvoir, fully Simone-Ernestine-Lucie-Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir

"Since the day of the air, the old frontiers are gone. When you think of the defense of England you no longer think of the chalk cliffs of Dover; you think of the Rhine." - Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl of Bewdley

"Whatever failures may have come to parliamentary government in countries which have not those traditions, and where it is not a natural growth, that is no proof that parliamentary government has failed." - Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl of Bewdley

"The universe does not behave according to our pre-conceived ideas. It continues to surprise us." - Stephen Hawking

"But he who dies in despair has lived his whole life in vain." - Theodor W. Adorno, born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund

"In the age of the individual's liquidation, the question of individuality must be raised anew." - Theodor W. Adorno, born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund

"All of us are experts at practicing virtue at a distance." - Theodore M. Hesburgh, fully Theodore Martin Hesburgh

"I stand for the square deal. But when I say that I am for the square deal, I mean not merely that I stand for fair play under the present rules of the game, but that I stand for having those rules changed so as to work for a more substantial equality of opportunity and of reward for equally good service. One word of warning, which, I think, is hardly necessary in Kansas. When I say I want a square deal for the poor man, I do not mean that I want a square deal for the man who remains poor because he has not got the energy to work for himself. If a man who has had a chance will not make good, then he has got to quit. And you men of the Grand Army, you want justice for the brave man who fought, and punishment for the coward who shirked his work. Is that not so?" - Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt

"Poverty is a bitter thing; but it is not as bitter as the existence of restless vacuity and physical, moral, and intellectual flabbiness, to which those doom themselves who elect to spend all their years in that vainest of all vain pursuits—the pursuit of mere pleasure as a sufficient end in itself." - Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt

"Practical efficiency is common and lofty idealism not uncommon; it is the combination which is necessary, and the combination is rare" - Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt

"By living deeply in the present moment we can understand the past better and we can prepare for a better future." - Thich Nhất Hanh

"We have to continue to learn. We have to be open. And we have to be ready to release our knowledge in order to come to a higher understanding of reality." - Thich Nhất Hanh

"We find ourselves ethically destitute just when, for the first time, we are faced with ultimacy, the irreversible closing down of the earth's functioning in its major life systems. Our ethical traditions know how to deal with suicide, homicide and even genocide, but these traditions collapse entirely when confronted with biocide, the killing of the life systems of the earth, and geocide, the devastation of the earth itself." - Thomas Berry

"The law of self-preservation is higher than written law." - Thomas Jefferson

"An author in a Trappist monastery is like a duck in a chicken coop. And he would give anything in the world to be a chicken instead of a duck." - Thomas Merton

"For each one of us, there is only one thing necessary: to fulfill our own destiny, according to God's will, to be what God wants us to be." - Thomas Merton

"In all His acts God orders all things, whether good or evil, for the good of those who know Him and seek Him and who strive to bring their own freedom under obedience to His divine purpose. All that is done by the will of God in secret is done for His glory and for the good of those whom He has chosen to share in His glory." - Thomas Merton

"In the spiritual life there is no such thing as an indifference to love or hate." - Thomas Merton

"Our willingness to take an alternative approach to a problem will perhaps relax the obsessive fixation of the adversary on his view, which he believes is the only reasonable possibility and which he is determined to impose on everyone else by coercion…This mission of humility in social life is not merely to edify, but to keep minds open to many alternatives. The rigidity of a certain type of thought has seriously impaired this capacity, which nonviolence must recover." - Thomas Merton

"Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real." - Thomas Merton

"Sunrise: hidden by pines and cedars to the east, I saw the red flame of the kingly sun glaring through the black trees, not like dawn but like a forest fire. Then the sun became distinguished as a person, and he shone silently and with solemn power through the branches, and the whole world was silent and calm." - Thomas Merton

"Suppose that my “poverty” be a hunger for spiritual riches: suppose that by pretending to empty myself, pretending to be silent, I am really trying to cajole God into enriching me with some experience - what then? Then everything becomes a distraction. All created things interfere with my quest for some special experience. I must shut them out, or they will tear me apart. What is worst — I, myself am distraction. But, unhappiest of all — if my prayer is centered in myself, if it seeks only an enrichment of my own self, my prayer will be my greatest potential distraction. Full of my own curiosity, I have eaten of the tree of Knowledge and torn myself away from myself and God. I am left rich and alone and nothing can assuage my hunger: everything I touch turns into distraction." - Thomas Merton

"True sanctity does not consist in trying to live without creatures. It consists in using the goods of life in order to do the will of God. It consists in using God’s creation in such a way that everything we touch and see and use and love gives new glory to God. To be a saint means to pass through the world gathering fruits for heaven from every tree and reaping God’s glory in every field. The saint is one who is in contact with God in every possible way, in every possible direction. He is united to God by the depths of his own being. He sees and touches God in everything and everyone around him. Everywhere he goes, the world rings and resounds (though silently) with the deep harmonies of God’s glory." - Thomas Merton

"In speaking of the fear of religion, I don’t mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility toward certain established religions and religious institutions, in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrines, social policies, and political influence. Nor am I referring to the association of many religious beliefs with superstition and the acceptance of evident empirical falsehoods. I am talking about something much deeper–namely, the fear of religion itself. I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself: I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that." - Thomas Nagel

"Article 92 - The International Court of Justice shall be the principal judicial organ of the United Nations. It shall function in accordance with the annexed Statute, which is based upon the Statute of the Permanent Court of International Justice and forms an integral part of the present Charter." - United Nations NULL

"Here then, is modern man, disposed to treat himself as a denizen of this world and nothing more. What is the huge and patent result? Well, it is plain enough. He begins to work and strive exclusively for an object in this world. The purpose of his work is not the reasonable satisfaction of human needs in order that the spiritual destiny of man may be achieved, but the accumulation of material power, prestige, gain. And man himself becomes the servant, the slave of this process. The end of human activity is no longer a human end, but something inhuman. Man is not to be regarded as the master and ruler of the world process. He has banished God, he has banished the eternal meaning from his politics and economics, but it is not his humanity that is allowed to supply the meaning. And it must be so. For in turning from God he turned from himself. In starting a non-religious civilization he impoverished his own manhood, and stood, a poor defenseless organism of dust, before the mighty forces which he had unchained but could no longer control." - W. G. Peck, fully William George Peck

"A man may well be condemned, not for doing something, but for doing nothing." - William Barclay

"True and genuine worship is when man, through his spirit attains to friendship and intimacy with God. True and genuine worship is not to come to a certain place; it is not to go through a certain ritual or liturgy; it is not even to bring certain gifts. True worship is when the spirit, the immortal and invisible part of man, speaks to and meets with God, who is immortal and invisible." - William Barclay

"I am well aware of the fact that the human race has known about the existence of a universal energy related to life for many ages. However, the basic task of natural science consisted of making this energy usable. This is the sole difference between my work and all preceding knowledge." - Wilhelm Reich

"If one studies the history of sexual suppression one finds that it does not exist in the early stages of culture formation. Therefore, it cannot be the prerequisite of culture. Rather, it appears at a relatively late stage of culture, at the time of the development of authoritarian patriarchy and of class distinctions. At that stage, the sexual interests of all begin to serve the profit interests of a minority. This process has assumed a solid organizational form in the institutions of patriarchal marriage and patriarchal family. With the suppression of sexuality the emotions undergo a change: a sex-negating religion begins to develop which gradually builds up its own sex-political organization, the church in all its forms, which has no other goal than that of eradicating sexual pleasure. This has its sociological reason in the exploitation of human work which sets in at this stage." - Wilhelm Reich

"Inquiry in the realm of Basic Natural Law is outside the judicial domain of this or any other kind of social administration anywhere on this globe, in any land, nation, or region." - Wilhelm Reich

"'Mysticism' here means, in the literal sense, a change of sensory impressions and organ sensations into something unreal and beyond this world." - Wilhelm Reich