This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Indeed, that is one of the most significant things about the power of love. There is no way under the sun to make a man worthy of love except by loving him. As soon as he realizes himself loved – if he is not so weak that he can no longer bear to be loved – he will feel himself instantly becoming worthy of love. He will respond by drawing a mysterious spiritual value out of his own depths, a new identity called into being by the love that is addressed to him.
It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is the beginning of blessedness and the consummation of humility is the perfection of all joy. Humility contains in itself the answer to all the great problems of the life of the soul. It is the only key to faith, with which the spiritual life begins: for faith and humility are inseparable. In perfect humility all selfishness disappears and your soul no longer lives for itself or in itself for God: and it is lost and submerged in Him and transformed into Him.
But if you say, you can still pass the violations over, then I ask, hath your house been burnt? Hath your property been destroyed before your face? Are your wife and children destitute of a bed to lie on, or bread to live on? Have you lost a parent or a child by their hands, and yourself the ruined and wretched survivor? If you have not, then you are not a judge of those who have. But if you have, and can still shake hands with the murderers, then you are unworthy of the name of husband, father, friend, or lover, and whatever may be your rank or title in life, you have the heart of a coward and the spirit of a sycophant.
Admiration | Blessings | Cost | Earth | Feelings | Gratitude | Light | Man | Nothing | Present | Pride | Receive | Sacrifice | Tragedy | Universe | World |
Independence is my happiness, and I view things as they are, without regard to place or person; my country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
To a Lady Before Marriage - Oh! form'd by Nature, and refin'd by Art, With charms to win, and sense to fix the heart! By thousands sought, Clotilda, canst thou free Thy croud of captives and descend to me? Content in shades obscure to waste thy life, A hidden beauty and a country wife. O! listen while thy summers are my theme, Ah! sooth thy partner in his waking dream! In some small hamlet on the lonely plain, Where Thames, through meadows, rolls his mazy train; Or where high Windsor, thick with greens array'd, Waves his old oaks, and spreads his ample shade, Fancy has figur'd out our calm retreat; Already round the visionary seat Our limes begin to shoot, our flowers to spring, The brooks to murmur, and the birds to sing. Where dost thou lie, thou thinly-peopled green? Thou nameless lawn, and village yet unseen? Where sons, contented with their native ground, Ne'er travell'd further than ten furlongs round; And the tann'd peasant, and his ruddy bride, Were born together, and together died. Where early larks best tell the morning light, And only Philomel disturbs the night, 'Midst gardens here my humble pile shall rise, With sweets surrounded of ten thousand dies; All savage where th' embroider'd gardens end, The haunt of echoes, shall my woods ascend; And oh! if Heaven th' ambitious thought approve, A rill shall warble cross the gloomy grove, A little rill, o'er pebbly beds convey'd, Gush down the steep, and glitter through the glade. What chearing scents those bordering banks exhale! How loud that heifer lows from yonder vale! That thrush how shrill! his note so clear, so high, He drowns each feather'd minstrel of the sky. Here let me trace beneath the purpled morn, The deep-mouth'd beagle, and the sprightly horn; Or lure the trout with well dissembled flies, Or fetch the fluttering partridge from the skies. Nor shall thy hand disdain to crop the vine, The downy peach, or flavour'd nectarine; Or rob the bee-hive of its golden hoard, And bear th' unbought luxuriance to thy board. Sometimes my books by day shall kill the hours, While from thy needle rise the silken flowers, And thou, by turns, to ease my feeble sight, Resume the volume, and deceive the night. Oh! when I mark thy twinkling eyes opprest, Soft whispering, let me warn my love to rest; Then watch thee, charm'd, while sleep locks every sense, And to sweet Heaven commend thy innocence. Thus reign'd our fathers o'er the rural fold, Wise, hale, and honest in the days of old; Till courts arose, where substance pays for show, And specious joys are bought with real woe. See Flavia's pendants, large, well-spread, and right, The ear that wears them hears a fool each night: Mark how the embroider'd colonel sneaks away, To shun the withering dame that made him gay; That knave, to gain a title, lost his fame; That rais'd his credit by a daughter's shame; This coxcomb's ribband cost him half his land, And oaks, unnumber'd, bought that fool a wand. Fond man, as all his sorrows were too few, Acquires strange wants that nature never knew, By midnight lamps he emulates the day, And sleeps, perverse, the chearful suns away; From goblets high-embost, his wine must glide, Found his clos'd sight the gorgeous curtain slide; Fruits ere their time to grace his pomp must rise, And three untasted courses glut his eyes. For this are nature's gentle calls withstood, The voice of conscience, and the bonds of blood; This wisdom thy reward for every pain, And this gay glory all thy mighty gain. Fair phantoms woo'd and scorn'd from age to age, Since bards began to laugh, and priests to rage. And yet, just curse on man's aspiring kind, Prone to ambition, to example blind, Our children's children shall our steps pursue, And the same errours be for ever new. Mean while in hope a guiltless country swain, My reed with warblings chears the imagin'd plain. Hail humble shades, where truth and silence dwell! The noisy town and faithless court farewell! Farewell ambition, once my darling flame! The thirst of lucre, and the charm of fame! In life's by-road, that winds through paths unknown, My days, though number'd, shall be all my own. Here shall they end, (O! might they twice begin) And all be white the Fates intend to spin.
Blessings | Fury | Heaven | Lord | Man | Nations | Nature | Peace | Pleasure | Pride | Rage | Sacred | Style | Learn | Think |
William Henley, fully William Ernest Henley
Margaritae Sorori - A late lark twitters from the quiet skies: And from the west, Where the sun, his day's work ended, Lingers as in content, There falls on the old, gray city An influence luminous and serene, A shining peace. The smoke ascends In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires Shine and are changed. In the valley Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun, Closing his benediction, Sinks, and the darkening air Thrills with a sense of the triumphing night-- Night with her train of stars And her great gift of sleep. So be my passing! My task accomplish'd and the long day done, My wages taken, and in my heart Some late lark singing, Let me be gather'd to the quiet west, The sundown splendid and serene, Death.
Chance | Heart | Man | Praise | Pride | Search | Sound | Worth | Loss |
TERRIFIÈD at Non-Existence— For such they deem’d the death of the body—Los his vegetable hands Outstretch’d; his right hand, branching out in fibrous strength, Seiz’d the Sun; his left hand, like dark roots, cover’d the Moon, And tore them down, cracking the heavens across from immense to immense. Then fell the fires of Eternity, with loud and shrill Sound of loud Trumpet, thundering along from heaven to heaven, A mighty sound articulate: ‘Awake! ye Dead, and come To Judgement from the four winds! awake, and come away!’ Folding like scrolls of the enormous volume of Heaven and Earth, With thunderous noise and dreadful shakings, rocking to and fro, The Heavens are shaken, and the Earth removèd from its place; The foundations of the eternal hills discover’d. The thrones of Kings are shaken, they have lost their robes and crowns; The Poor smite their oppressors, they awake up to the harvest; 1 The naked warriors rush together down to the seashore, Trembling before the multitudes of slaves now set at liberty: They are become like wintry flocks, like forests stripp’d of leaves. The Oppressèd pursue like the wind; there is no room for escape.… The Books of Urizen unroll with dreadful noise! The folding Serpent Of Orc began to consume in fierce raving fire; his fierce flames Issu’d on all sides, gathering strength in animating volumes, Roaring abroad on all the winds, raging intense, reddening Into resistless pillars of fire, rolling round and round, gathering Strength from the earths consum’d, and heavens, and all hidden abysses, Where’er the Eagle has explor’d, or Lion or Tiger trod, Or where the comets of the night, or stars of day Have shot their arrows or long-beamèd spears in wrath and fury. And all the while the Trumpet sounds. From the clotted gore, and from the hollow den Start forth the trembling millions into flames of mental fire, Bathing their limbs in the bright visions of Eternity. Then, like the doves from pillars of smoke, the trembling families Of women and children throughout every nation under heaven Cling round the men in bands of twenties and of fifties, pale As snow that falls round a leafless tree upon the green. Their oppressors are fall’n; they have stricken them; they awake to life. Yet, pale, the Just man stands erect, and looking up to Heav’n. Trembling and strucken by the universal stroke, the trees unroot; The rocks groan horrible and run about; the mountains and Their rivers cry with a dismal cry; the cattle gather together, Lowing they kneel before the heavens; the wild beasts of the forests Tremble. The Lion, shuddering, asks the Leopard: ‘Feelest thou The dread I feel, unknown before? My voice refuses to roar, And in weak moans I speak to thee. This night, Before the morning’s dawn, the Eagle call’d the Vulture, The Raven call’d the Hawk. I heard them from my forests, Saying: “Let us go up far, for soon I smell upon the wind A terror coming from the South.” The Eagle and Hawk fled away At dawn, and ere the sun arose, the Raven and Vulture follow’d. Let us flee also to the North.’ They fled. The Sons of Men Saw them depart in dismal droves. The trumpets sounded loud, And all the Sons of Eternity descended into Beulah.
Earth | Happy | Heaven | Life | Life | Pity | Pride | Tears | Will | Forgive |
Care in such sort that thou be sure of this: Care keep thee not from heaven and heavenly bliss.
Pride |
And, of all lies (be that one poet's boast) the lie that flatters I abhor the most.
Will Rogers, fully William Penn Adair "Will" Rogers
I think the same fellow who started that self-made man gag started that other asinine expression, “100 per cent American.” Every human from the time he is weaned is self-made. And how do you know when a man is made anyhow? He may be only partly finished when a lot of guys call him made.
Government | Pride | World | Government | Govern |
Walt Disney, fully Walter Elias "Walt" Disney
I think what I want Disneyland to be most of all is a happy place — a place where adults and children can experience together some of the wonders of life, of adventure, and feel better because of it.
Pride |
Walt Whitman, fully Walter "Walt" Whitman
Flood-tide below me! I see you face to face! Clouds of the west—sun there half an hour high—I see you also face to face. Crowds of men and women attired in the usual costumes, how curious you are to me! On the ferry-boats the hundreds and hundreds that cross, returning home, are more curious to me than you suppose, and you that shall cross from shore to shore years hence are more to me, and more in my meditations, than you might suppose.
Walt Whitman, fully Walter "Walt" Whitman
The greatest city is that which has the greatest men and women.
A highly developed moral nature joined to an undeveloped intellectual nature, an undeveloped artistic nature, and a very limited religious nature, is of necessity repulsive. It represents a bit of human nature — a good bit, of course, but a bit only — in disproportionate, unnatural and revolting prominence.
A critic is never too severe when he only detects the faults of an author. But he is worse than too severe when, in consequence of this detection, be presumes to place himself on a level with genius.
Until we end our violence against the earth- a matter ignored by most pacifists, as the issue of military violence is ignored by most conservationists-how can we hope to end our violence against each other? The earth, which we all have in common, is our deepest bond, and our behavior toward it cannot help but be an earnest of our consideration for each other and for our descendants.
Despair | Enlightenment | Grief | Land | Man | Pride | Sense | Thought | World | Think | Thought |