This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
I use the Scriptures, not as an arsenal to be resorted to only for arms and weapons, but as a matchless temple, where I delight to contemplate the beauty, the symmetry, and the magnificence of the structure, and to increase my awe and excite my devotion to the Deity there preached and adored.
It is not wisdom but ignorance that teaches men presumption. Genius may sometimes be arrogant, but nothing is so diffident as knowledge.
Genius | Ignorance | Knowledge | Men | Nothing | Presumption | Wisdom |
Much has been said of the wisdom of old age. Old age is wise, I grant, for itself, but not wise for the community. It is wise in declining new enterprises, for it has not the power nor the time to execute them; wise in shrinking from difficulty, for it has not the strength to overcome it; wise in avoiding danger, for it lacks the faculty of ready and swift action, by which dangers are parried and converted into advantages. But this is not wisdom for mankind at large, by whom new enterprises must be undertaken, dangers met, and difficulties surmounted.
Action | Age | Danger | Difficulty | Mankind | Old age | Power | Strength | Time | Wisdom | Wise | Old |
Evening is the delight of virtuous age; it seems an emblem of the tranquil close of busy life - serene, placid, and mild, with the impress of its great Creator stamped upon it; it spreads its quiet wings over the grave, and seems to promise that all shall be peace beyond it.
Age | Grave | Life | Life | Peace | Promise | Quiet | Wisdom |
What, after all, is heaven, but a transition from dim guesses and blind struggling with a mysterious and adverse fate to the fullness of all wisdom - from ignorance, in a word, to knowledge, but knowledge of what order?
Fate | Heaven | Ignorance | Knowledge | Order | Wisdom | Fate |
If the government should be taught that the highest wisdom of a state is a wise and masterly inactivity, an invaluable blessing will be conferred.
Government | Inactivity | Will | Wisdom | Wise | Government |
It requires as much reflection and wisdom to know what is not to be put into a sermon as what is.
Reflection | Wisdom |
Music is the language of praise; and one of the most essential preparations for eternity is delight in praising God; a higher acquirement, I do think, than even delight and devotedness to prayer.
Eternity | God | Language | Music | Praise | Prayer | Wisdom |
Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. It may not be difficult to store up in the mind a vast quantity of facts within a comparatively short time, but the ability to form judgments requires the severe discipline of hard work and the tempering heat of experience and maturity.
Ability | Discipline | Experience | Knowledge | Mind | Time | Wisdom | Work |
Will and Wisdom are both mighty leaders. Our times worship Will.
The artist (in literature) appeals to that part of our being which is not dependent on wisdom; to that in us which is a gift and not an acquisition - and, therefore, more permanently enduring. He speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty, and pain.
Beauty | Capacity | Literature | Mystery | Pain | Pity | Sense | Wisdom | Wonder |
Knowledge dwells in heads replete with thoughts of other men; wisdom in minds attentive to their own.
In idle wishes fools supinely stay; be there a will and wisdom finds a way.