This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
A man's silence is wonderful to listen to. Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
We took the liberty to make some enquiries concerning the ground of their pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury, and observed that we considered all mankind as our friends who had done us no wrong, nor had given us any provocation. The Ambassador [of Tripoli] answered us that it was founded on the Laws of their Prophet, that it was written in their Koran, that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners, and that every Musselman who should be slain in battle was sure to go to Paradise.
Administration | Better | Cause | Decision | Devotion | Government | Hope | Law | Opinion | Partiality | People | Power | Right | Spirit | Government | Think |
Were I to commence my administration again, the first question I would ask respecting a candidate would be, Does he use ardent spirits?
Argument | Belief | Body | Confidence | Dependence | Evidence | Faith | Fear | God | Hypocrisy | Influence | Lord | Man | Men | Mind | Money | Nothing | Object | Opinion | Plan | Power | Presumption | Principles | Public | Reason | Religion | Rights | Thinking | Trust | Truth | Will | World | God |
Contradictions have always existed in the soul of [individuals]. But it is only when we prefer analysis to silence that they become a constant and insoluble problem. We are not meant to resolve all contradictions but to live with them and rise above them and see them in the light of exterior and objective values which make them trivial by comparison.
Contemplation | Day | Desolation | Devotion | Discipline | God | Joy | Justice | Labor | Magic | Obscurity | Obscurity | Peace | Relationship | Security | Spirit | Suffering | World | God | Contemplation | Happiness |
The burden of the national debt consists not in its being so many millions, or so many hundred millions, but in the quantity of taxes collected every year to pay the interest. If this quantity continue the same, the burden of the national debt is the same to all intents and purposes, be the capital more or less.
Art | Church | Contemplation | Devotion | Discovery | Evidence | Life | Life | Order | Power | Principles | Science | Study | System | Wisdom | Work | Discovery | Art | Contemplation |
Formless realities like soul etc. cannot be apprehended by senses and those which are formless are eternal.
Wilhelm von Humboldt, fully Friedrich Wilhelm Christian Karl Ferdinand von Humboldt
Providence certainly does not favor just certain individuals, but the deep wisdom of its counsel, instruction and ennoblement extends to all.
Devotion | Individual | Prayer | Words |
You may now ask how it can be true that this image of God, which is man’s soul, can be restored to His likeness here in this life; it would seem to be impossible. You must admit you are very far from such a position. If it were restored we would possess sound understanding, clear vision, and pure ardent Love of God and Spiritual things all of the time. Your thoughts, your reason and affections of the soul are so immersed in Earthly things that your have little perception of Spiritual things.
Better | Contemplation | Devotion | Experience | God | Grace | Guidance | Knowledge | Love | Order | Soul | Surrender | Will | Guidance | God | Contemplation |
Once you touch the biographies of human beings, the notion that political beliefs are logically determined collapses like a pricked balloon.
Attention | Devotion | Force | Inactivity |
Its massive height near the City of Heaven joins a thousand mountains to the corner of the sea. Clouds, when I look back, close behind me, mists, when I enter them, are gone. A central peak divides the wilds and weather into many valleys... Needing a place to spend the night, I call to a wood-cutter over the river.
Day | Devotion | Doubt | Gold | Happy | Life | Life | Man | Purpose | Purpose | Will | Wise |
There is something nobly simple and pure in a taste for the cultivation of forest trees. It argues, I think, a sweet and generous nature to have his strong relish for the beauties of vegetation, and this friendship for the hardy and glorious sons of the forest. He who plants a tree looks forward to future ages, and plants for posterity. Nothing could be less selfish than this.
Better | Devotion | Excellence | Joy | Self | Sense | Sentiment | World | Excellence |
Mahomet now proceeded to execute the great object of his religious aspirations, the purifying of the sacred edifice from the symbols of idolatry, with which it was crowded. All the idols in and about it, to the number of three hundred and sixty, were thrown down and destroyed. Among these, the most renowned was Hobal, an idol brought from Balka, in Syria, and fabled to have the power of granting rain. It was, of course, a great object of worship among the inhabitants of the thirsty desert. There were statues of Abraham and Ishmael also, represented with divining arrows in their hands ; an outrage on their memories, said Mahomet, being symbols of a diabolical art which they had never practiced. In reverence of their memories, therefore, these statues were demolished. There were paintings, also, depicting angels in the guise of beautiful women. The angels, said Mahomet, indignantly, are no such beings. There are celestial hour is provided in paradise for the solace of true believers ; but angels are ministering spirits of the Most High, and of too pure a nature to admit of sex. The paintings were accordingly obliterated. Even a dove, curiously carved of wood, he broke with his own hands, and cast upon the ground, as savoring of idolatry.
Better | Chastity | Day | Devotion | Giving | God | Gratitude | Life | Life | Tenderness | Wife | God |
We could lose, and I think we need to face that. I was speaking in Nebraska the other day and a very intelligent man came up afterward and said in a very kind and intelligent way, Of course you know you may be fighting a losing battle. And I answered, I’ve known for 30 years that I may be fighting a losing battle. The question to me is not whether I’m going to win or not, but whether I’m going to fight or not.
Capital punishment | Hypocrisy | Life | Life | Opposition | Public | Punishment | Society | Society | Think |
W. H. Auden, fully Wystan Hugh Auden
I said earlier that I do not believe an artist's life throws much light upon his works. I do believe, however, that, more often than most people realize, his works may throw light upon his life. An artist with certain imaginative ideas in his head may then involve himself in relationships which are congenial to them.
W. E. B. Du Bois, fully William Edward Burghardt Du Bois
Herein lie buried many things which if read with patience may show the strange meaning of being black here in the dawning of the Twentieth Century. This meaning is not without interest to you, Gentle Reader; for the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line.
Chance | Civilization | Culture | Devotion | Humanity | Ignorance | Men | Will | World |
Vladimir Lenin, fully Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
Human child birth is an act which transforms the woman into an almost lifeless, bloodstained heap of flesh, tortured, tormented and driven frantic by pain.
Ability | Correctness | Devotion | Discipline | Self-sacrifice | Leadership |