This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
And now this spell was snapt: once more I viewed the ocean green, And look'd far forth, yet little saw Of what had else been seen - Like one that on a lonesome road Doth walk in fear and dread, And having once turn'd round, walks on And turns no more his head; Because he knows a frightful fiend Doth close behind him tread.
In eddying course when leaves began to fly, And Autumn in her lap the store to strew, As ’mid wild scenes I chanced the Muse to woo Through glens untrod, and woods that frowned on high, Two sleeping Nymphs with wonder mute I spy! 5 And lo, she ’s gone! In robe of dark green hue, ’T was Echo from her sister Silence flew; For quick the hunter’s horn resounded to the sky! In shade affrighted Silence melts away; Not so her sister:—hark! for onward still 10 With far heard step she takes her listening way, Bounding from rock to rock, and hill to hill! Ah, mark the merry maid in mockful play With thousand mimic tones the laughing forest fill.
Rudolf Steiner, fully Rudolf Joseph Lorenz Steiner
People must come closer to one another than they used to be, each becoming an awakener of everyone he meets. Modern human beings entering life today have stored up far too much karma not to feel a destined connection with every individual they encounter. In earlier ages, souls were younger and had not formed so many karmic ties. Now it has become necessary to be awakened not just by nature, but by the human beings with whom we are karmically connected and whom we want to seek.
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
How will you know the difficulties of being human, if you're always flying off to blue perfection?
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
Bitter your acts, bitter am I, Kindness your deeds, kindness am I, Pleasant and gentle, so you are, Fine honeyed lips and sweet talker.
Grief |
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
Whoever gives reverence receives reverence.
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
I searched for God among the Christians and on the Cross and therein I found Him not. I went into the ancient temples of idolatry; no trace of Him was there. I entered the mountain cave of Hira and then went as far as Qandhar but God I found not. With set purpose I fared to the summit of Mount Caucasus and found there only 'anqa's habitation. Then I directed my search to the Kaaba, the resort of old and young; God was not there even. Turning to philosophy I inquired about him from ibn Sina but found Him not within his range. I fared then to the scene of the Prophet's experience of a great divine manifestation only a two bow-lengths' distance from him but God was not there even in that exalted court. Finally, I looked into my own heart and there I saw Him; He was nowhere else.
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
Your hand opens and closes, opens and closes. If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed. Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as birds' wings.
Grief |
War knows no power. Safe shall be my going, Secretly armed against all death's endeavor Safe though all safety's lost safe where men fall And if these poor limbs die, safest of all.
Grief | Melancholy | Wise | Think |
John Chrysostom, fully Saint John Chrysostom
Men have the power of thinking that they may avoid sin
Bereavement | Books | Comfort | Grief | Will |
Sallust, full name Carus Valerius Sailustius Crispus NULL
No man underestimates the wrongs he suffers; many take them more seriously than is right.
Grief |
Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
I am better able to retract what I did not say than what I did.
Grief |
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
In traveling: a man must carry knowledge with him, if he would bring home knowledge.
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
Where necessity ends, curiosity begins; and no sooner are we supplied with everything that nature can demand, than we sit down to contrive artificial appetites.
Grief |
Sigmund Freud, born Sigismund Schlomo Freud
Man found that he was faced with the acceptance of "spiritual" forces, that is to say such forces as cannot be comprehended by the senses, particularly not by sight, and yet having undoubted, even extremely strong, effects. If we may trust to language, it was the movement of the air that provided the image of spirituality, since the spirit borrows its name from the breath of wind (animus, spiritus, Hebrew: ruach = smoke). The idea of the soul was thus born as the spiritual principle in the individual ... Now the realm of spirits had opened for man, and he was ready to endow everything in nature with the soul he had discovered in himself.
Body | Consciousness | Contemplation | Death | Distinction | Evil | Existence | Future | Grief | Guilt | Individual | Life | Life | Thought | Contemplation | Thought |
Our creationist detractors charge that evolution is an unproved and unprovable charade-- a secular religion masquerading as science. They claim, above all, that evolution generates no predictions, never exposes itself to test, and therefore stands as dogma rather than disprovable science. This claim is nonsense. We make and test risky predictions all the time; our success is not dogma, but a highly probable indication of evolution's basic truth.
Error | Grief | Imagination | Man | Science | Truth | Work | Truths |
Clearly, all fear has an element of resistance and a leaning away from the moment. Its dynamic is not unlike that of strong desire except that fear leans backward into the last safe moment while desire leans forward toward the next possibility of satisfaction. Each lacks presence.
Anger | Discovery | Experience | Grief | Heart | Pain | Suffering | Thought | Discovery | Child | Thought |