Great Throughts Treasury

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.

Service

"The goal of wisdom and the goal of service are the same. The ignorant one fails to see that knowledge and action are one." - Bhagavad Gītā, simply known as Gita NULL

"Knowledge is wonderful and truth serene, but man in their service bleeds." - Bhartrihari NULL

"All men naturally hate one another. They employ lust as far as possible in the service of the public weal. But this is only a [pretense] and a false image of love; for at bottom it is only hate." - Blaise Pascal

"There is no cruelty so inexorable and unrelenting, as that which proceeds from a bigoted and presumptuous supposition of doing service to God." - Charles Caleb Colton

"Of all the passions, jealously is that which exacts the hardest service, and pays the bitterest wages. Its service is to watch the success of our enemy; its wages to be sure of it." - Charles Caleb Colton

"There is no cruelty so inexorable and unrelenting as that which proceeds from a bigoted and presumptuous supposition of doing service to God. The victim of the fanatical persecutor will find that the stronger the motives he can urge for mercy are, the weaker will be his chance for obtaining it, for the merit of his destruction will be supposed to rise in value in proportion as it is effected at the expense of every feeling both of justice and of humanity." - Charles Caleb Colton

"Our responsibility is to allow our deepest drivers and talents to find expression through whatever form of service or career we choose, in the most positive, altruistic way we can." - Dan Millman, born Daniel Jay Millman

"Spiritual truth is truth in whatever age, but the tasks of its service change as society changes." - Dorothy Thompson

"Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings." - Edmund Burke

"Human service is the highest form of self-interest for the person who serves." - Elbert Green Hubbard

"Humility is the wish to be great and the dread of being called great. It is the wish to help and the dread of thanks. It is the love of service and the distaste for rule. It is trying to be good and blushing when caught at it." - Frank Crane

"When I find any officer that answers me with firmness, intelligence, and clearness, I set him down in my list for making use of his service on proper occasions." - Frederick II, `Frederick the Great’ NULL

"Architecture paves the way, as it were, for the adequate realization of the God, toiling and wrestling in his service with external nature, and seeking to extricate it from the chaos of finitude, and the abortiveness of chance." - Georg Hegel, fully Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

"The only service a friend can render is to keep up your courage by holding up to you a mirror in which you can see a noble image of yourself." - George Bernard Shaw

"Military service produces moral imbecility, ferocity and cowardice." - George Bernard Shaw

"Timely service, like timely gifts, is doubled in value." - George MacDonald

"A man’s real faith is never contained in his creed, nor is his creed an article of his faith. The last is never adopted. This it is that permits him to smile ever, and to live even as bravely as he does. And yet he clings anxiously to his creed, as to a straw, thinking that that does him good service because his sheet anchor does not drag." - Henry David Thoreau, born David Henry Thoreau

"The life of a man consists not in seeing visions and in dreaming dreams, but in active charity and in willing service." - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"The greatest service we can perform for others is to help them to help themselves." - Horace Mann

"The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others." - Indira Gandhi, fully Indirā Priyadarśinī Gāndhī

"This is the spirit of our practice: love - not attachment, but something much deeper - infusing our awareness, enabling us to open to and accept the truth of each moment; and service that feels our intimate connectedness with all things and responds to the wholeness of life." - Jack Kornfield

"Of all the passions, jealously is that which exacts the hardest service, and pays the bitterest wages. Its service is to watch the success of our enemy; its wages to be sure of it." - James Bryant Conant

"All the grand agencies which the progress of mankind evolves are the aggregate result of countless wills, each of which, thinking merely of its own end, and perhaps fully gaining it, is at the same time enlisted by Providence in the secret service of the world." - James Martineau

"The first party of painted savages who raised a few huts upon the Thames did not dream of the London they were creating, or know that in the lighting the fire on their hearth they were kindling one of the great foci of Time... All the grand agencies which the progress of mankind evolves are formed in the same unconscious way. They are the aggregate results of countless single wills, each of which, thinking merely of its own end, and perhaps fully gaining it, is at the same time enlisted by Providence in the secret service of the world." - James Martineau

"We are each not other’s “keepers,” we are each other’s brothers and sisters. And it is in the struggle and service with our brothers and sisters, individually and collectively, that we find the meaning of life." - Jesse Jackson, fully Jesse Louis Jackson

"God made thee perfect, not immutable; and good he made thee, but to persevere he left it in thy power, ordained thy will by nature free, not over-rul’d by Fate inextricable, or strict necessity; our voluntarie service he requires, not our necessitated, such with him findes no acceptance, nor can find, for how can hearts, not free, be tri’d whether they serve willing or not, who will but what they must by Destinie, and can no other choose?" - John Milton

"In this age the man who dares to think for himself and act independently does a service to his race." - John Stuart Mill

"Zeal is a great ease to a malicious man, by making him believe he does God service, whilst he is gratifying the bent of a perverse revengeful temper." - Joseph Addison

"The life of a mythology derives from the vitality of its symbols as metaphors delivering, not simply the idea, but a sense of actual participation in such a realization of transcendence, infinity, and abundance, as this of which the upanishadic authors tell. Indeed, the first and most essential service of a mythology is this one, of opening the mind and heart to the utter wonder of all being. And the second service, then, is cosmological: of representing the universe and whole spectacle of nature, both as known to the mind and as beheld by the eye, as an epiphany of such kind that when lightning flashes, or a setting sun ignites the sky, or a deer is seen standing alerted, the exclamation "Ah!" may be uttered as a recognition of divinity." - Joseph Campbell

"A positive emotional state entrains, or unites, our systems for thought, feeling, and action; shifts our concentration and energy toward support of our intellectual and creative forebrain (old mammalian and neocortex); and allows us to both learn and remember easily. In very young children, the primary caregiver’s emotional state determines the child’s state, and therefore the child’s development in general. Any kind of negative response, any form of fear or anger shifts our attention and energy from verbal-intellectual brain to our oldest survival brain. This shift shortchanges our intellect, cripples our learning and memory, and can lock our neocortex into service of our lower brain." - Joseph Chilton Pearce, aka Joe

"The most generous dreams of the past have not become immediate practical necessities: a word-wide cooperation of people, a more just distribution of al the goods of life; the use of knowledge and energy or the service of life, and the use of life itself for the extension of the human spirit to provinces where human values and purposes could not heretofore penetrate. If we awaken in time to overcome the automatisms and irrational compulsions that are now pushing nations toward destruction, we shall create a universal community." - Lewis Mumford

"Universal service is the price of peace." - Lewis Mumford

"Service makes men competent." - Lyman Abbott

"Even if the Universe existed for man’s sake and man existed for the purpose of serving God, one must still ask: What is the end of serving God? He does not become more perfect if all His creatures serve Him. Nor would he lose anything if nothing existed beside Him. It might perhaps be replied that the service of God is not intended for God’s perfection, but for our own. Then, however, the question arises: What is the object of our being perfect? Pressing the inquiry as to the purpose of Creation, we must at last arrive at the answer: it was the will of God. Logic as well as tradition prove clearly that the Universe does not exist for man’s sake, but that all things in it exist each for its own sake." - Maimonides, given name Moses ben Maimon or Moshe ben Maimon, known as "Rambam" NULL

"The service of God is not intended for God’s perfection; it is intended for our perfection." - Maimonides, given name Moses ben Maimon or Moshe ben Maimon, known as "Rambam" NULL

"Service is the rent each of us pays for living - the very purpose of life and not something you do in your spare time or after you have reached your personal goals." - Marian Wright Edelman

"The life of work is necessary and the life of contemplation is good. In service the man gathers the harvest that has been sown in contemplation." - Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim

"Basically, human beings want satisfaction and fulfillment, and we especially want to feel a sense of accomplishment in what we are doing. Being of service and achieving something of value to others while feeling balanced and healthy are the essential reasons for working." - Michael Toms and Justine Willis Toms

"The fruit of silence is prayer. The fruit of prayer is faith. The fruit of faith is love. The fruit of love is service. The fruit of service is peace." - Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu NULL

"Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth." - Muhammad Ali, born Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr.

"You can start right where you stand and apply the habit of going the extra mile by rendering more service and better service than you are now being paid for." - Napoleon Hill

"Life is a crusade in the service of God. Whether we wished to or not, we set out as crusaders to free… that God buried in matter and in our souls." - Nikos Kazantzakis

"If persons are going to be independent thinkers, they are probably going to pay a cost. One has to begin with the way the world works: the world does not reward honesty and independence, it rewards obedience and service. It's a world of concentrated power, and those who have power are not going to reward people who question that power." - Noam Chomsky, fully Avram Noam Chomsky

"More democratic societies, including the United States, instituted measures to impose discipline on the domestic population and to institute unpopular measures under the guise of "combating terror," exploiting the atmosphere of fear and the demand for "patriotism" - which in practice means: "You shut up and I'll pursue my own agenda relentlessly." The Bush administration used the opportunity to advance its assault against most of the population, and future generations, in service to the narrow corporate interests that dominate the administration to an extent even beyond the norm." - Noam Chomsky, fully Avram Noam Chomsky

"Go out and get interested in the human problems that are everywhere around us. Help to improve the human lot. This service of love is perhaps the healthiest attitude in this world. It puts one into the main stream of the human race, where the profound problems re, and as one participates and gets involved and learns to know people and they him, one is loving and being loved and life becomes good - very good. Love is never a soft, genial attitude, indeed it is far from it. For example, when you really love the poor and underprivileged, you will get and fight for better conditions for all men. The fight is often against prejudice and entrenched greed, and it is no easy struggle to overcome these. But love is tough and never gives up as long as one of God’s children is the victim of injustice and mistreatment." - Norman Vincent Peale

"Don’t complain about what you don’t have. Use what you’ve got. To do less than your best is a sin. Every single one of us has the power for greatness, because greatness is determined by service – to yourself and to others." - Oprah Winfrey, born Oprah Gail Winfrey

"Every single one of us has the power for greatness, because greatness is determined by service – to yourself and to others." - Oprah Winfrey, born Oprah Gail Winfrey

"Learn to see God in all persons, of whatever race or creed. You will know what divine love is when you begin to feel your oneness with every human being, not before. In mutual service we forget the little self and glimpse the one measureless self, the spirit that unifies all men." - Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh

"To be truly united in knowledge, love, and service with all beings, and thus to realize one’s self in the all-pervading God is the essence of goodness, and this is the keynote of the teachings of the Upanishads: Life is immense!" -

"The earth is a machine which yields almost gratuitous service to every application of intellect. Every plant is a manufacturer of soil. In the stomach of the plant development begins. The tree can draw on the whole air, the whole earth, on all the rolling main. The plant is all suction-pipe, imbibing from the ground by its root, from the air by its leaves, with all its might." - Ralph Waldo Emerson