After seeing what "charity" has done to this nation and the world for that matter, plus my own experiences over the years I don't think helping is always helpful. Although I have helped many people even when it took more than I could really afford. I've also been helped by a few people. Some, in hindsight I would not give to now. I am more on the Ayn Rand types than most modern-day preachers. Others I like are Churchill and CS Lewis, although not sure they are what you'd call philosophers.
I think we can learn from them all. Lately, I have been looking at Socrates..Know thyself, The unexamined life is not worth living,
As a young man in my 20s I became fascinated by the New England Transcendentalist movement. I still admire that kind of thinking, the primacy of the individual, concept of personal responsibility, the importance and value of Nature, etc.
@Johnny Forster I remember the Transcendental Meditation movement of the early 70s. I've read the classical Greek philosophers. I took a couple of philosophy classes when I was in my early 40s, trying to finish up my degree. I've always found it to be concurrently comforting and concerning that the nature of Man changes very little. I would say that Carl Jung is among my favorites, but that's probably because he is more contemporary that most others. PBS aired a mini-series on him in the late 80s: "The Wisdom of the Dream." I recall an analogy he made regarding grouping people that always stuck with me: "You can average the characteristics (size, shape, color, weight) of all the pebbles in a stream and not accurately describe a single one of them."
Carl Jung is also one of my favorites. A giant of a mind. He will be remembered and studied for a very long time.