This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Lucan, full name Marcus Annaeus Lucanus NULL
As far as the stars are from the earth, and as different as fire is from water, so much do self-interest and integrity differ.
Earth | Integrity | Self | Self-interest | Wisdom |
Romances, in general, are calculated rather to fire the imagination than to inform the judgment.
Imagination | Judgment | Wisdom |
If these little sparks of holy fire which I have thus heaped up together do not give life to your prepared and already enkindled spirit, yet they will sometimes help to entertain a thought, to actuate a passion, to employ and hallow a fancy.
Life | Life | Little | Passion | Spirit | Thought | Will | Wisdom |
Young “Savage” Seminarians NULL
You tell us that baptism is absolutely necessary to go to heaven. If there were a man so good that he had never offended God, and if he died without baptism, would he go to hell, never having given any offense to God? If he goes to hell, then God must not love all good people, since He throws one into the fire. You teach us that God existed before the creation of heaven and earth. If He did, where did He live, since there was neither heaven nor earth? You say that the angels were created n the beginning of the world, and that those who disobeyed were cast into hell. How can that be so, since you say the angels sinned before earth’s creation, and hell is in the depths of the earth? You declare that those who go to hell do not come out of it, and yet you relate stories of the damned who have appeared in the world - how is that to be understood. Ah, how I would like to kill devils, since they do so much harm! But if they are made like men and some are even among men, do they still feel the fire of hell? Why is it that they do not repent for having offended God? If they did repent, would not God be merciful to them? If Our Lord has suffered for all sinners, why do not they receive pardon from him? You say that the virgin, mother of Jesus Christ, is not God, and that she has never offended God. You also say that her Son has redeemed all men, and atoned for all; but if she has done nothing wrong, her son could not redeem her nor atone for her.
Angels | Beginning | Earth | God | Good | Harm | Heaven | Hell | Kill | Lord | Love | Man | Men | Mother | Nothing | Offense | Pardon | People | Receive | Teach | Wisdom | World | Wrong | God |
The advice of a scholar, whose piles of learning were set on fire by imagination, is never to be forgotten. Proportion an hour's reflection to an hour's reading, and so dispirit the book into the student.
Advice | Imagination | Learning | Reading | Reflection | Scholar | Wisdom |
To stand held only by the invisible chains of higher duty, and so standing, to let the fire creep up to the heart - that is the truer heroism.
Dōgen, aka Dōgen Kigen, Eihei Dōgen, titled as Dōgen Zenji NULL
Life and death are nothing but the mind. Years, months, days, and hours are nothing but the mind. Dreams, illusions, and mirages are nothing but the mind. The bubbles of water and the flames of fire are nothing but the mind. The flowers of the spring and the moon of the autumn are nothing but the mind. Confusions and dangers are nothing but the mind.
There is no fire like passion, no shark like hatred, no snare like folly, and no torrent like greed.
Yesterday is ashes; tomorrow is wood. Only today does the fire burn brightly.
Tomorrow |
Ko Hung, aka Ge Hong, courtesy name Zhichuan
If one is moderate in developing one’s justifiable inclinations, and succeeds in freeing oneself of one’s inhibitions, this will not shorten one’s life span, but increase it. All of these things can be compared to fire and water: only their excessive use is harmful.
Keep yourselves away from envy; because it eateth up and taketh away good actions, like as fire eateth up and burneth wood.
Robert M. Linder, fully Robert Mitchell Linder
Supported by the authority of all institutions, parenthood has come to amount to little more than a campaign against individuality. Every father and every mother trembles lest an offspring, in act or thought, should be different from his fellows; and the smallest display of uniqueness in a child becomes the signal for the application of drastic measures aimed at stamping out that small fire of noncompliance by which personal distinctness is expressed. In an atmosphere of anxiety, in a climate of apprehension, the parental conspiracy against children is planned.
Anxiety | Anxiety | Authority | Children | Conspiracy | Display | Father | Individuality | Little | Mother | Thought | Child |
Toleration is not the opposite of intoleration, but it is the counterfeit of it. Both are despotisms. The one assumes to itself the right of withholding liberty of conscience, and the other of granting it. The one is the pope, armed with fire and fagot, and the other is the pope selling or granting indulgences.
Conscience | Intolerance | Liberty | Right | Toleration |
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
Flattery’s fire is hidden. Its sweet taste is apparent, but the smoke is bound to come out at last.
Sa’ib of Tabriz, aka Mirza Muhammad Ali Sa'ib, Saib Isfahani or Sa'ib Of Esfahan NULL
The enjoyments of both worlds will not satisfy the greedy man: burning fire always has an appetite.