This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars are in the poorest thing superfluous. Allow not nature more than nature needs, man's life is cheap as beast's. Thou art a lady; if only to go warm were gorgeous, why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear'st, which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true need— you heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!
Oh why rebuke you him that loves you so? Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe.
Man |
One fire burns out another's burning, One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish; Turn giddy and be holp by backward turning; One desperate grief cures with another's languish. Romeo and Juliet (Benvolio at I, ii)
World |
Pardon this fault, and by my soul I swear I never more will break an oath with thee.
POLONIUS:[Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't. — Will you walk out of the air, my lord? HAMLET: Into my grave.
There is nothing more to say, they have all gone away from the house on the hill.
Murasaki Shikibu, aka Lady Murasaki
The memories of long love gather like drifting snow, poignant as the mandarin ducks who float side by side in sleep.
Put on what weary negligence you please, you and your fellows; I'll have it come to question: if he dislike it, let him to our sister, whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one, not to be over-ruled. Idle old man, that still would manage those authorities that he hath given away! Now, by my life, old fools are babes again; and must be used with cheques as flatteries,--when they are seen abused. Remember what I tell you.
Spirit |
Ishvarakrishna, aka Iśvarakṛṣṇa NULL
Defects of the eleven organs, together with impairment of the intellect, are said to constitute infirmity. Injuries to the intellect are seventeen, resulting from the inversion of complacency and attainment.
Buddhist temples are of three types. I. Temples which are strictly MahÄyÄna. These are temples where bodhisattva monks who are new to training reside. II. Temples which are strictly HÄ«nayÄna. These are temples where only the HÄ«nayÄna and vinaya teachers reside. III. Temples where both MahÄyÄna and HÄ«nayÄna practice together. These are temples where bodhisattva monks who have trained for a long time reside. Now in the Tendai Lotus School the annual ordinands [candidates for ordination] are all new practitioners who have all directed their minds to the MahÄyÄna and for twelve years will be made to reside deep in the mountains at the temple Shishu Sanmai-in 四種三昧院. Upon completion of their training they will provisionally receive the lesser [HÄ«nayÄna] precepts as it benefits others and they will be permitted to provisionally reside in a temple where both [MahÄyÄna and HÄ«nayÄna] practices are carried out.
Man | Object | People | Thought | Time | Waiting | Wrong | Child | Thought |
Everybody knows that fanaticism is religion caricatured; bears, indeed, about the same relation to it that a monkey bears to a man; yet, with many, contempt of fanaticism is received as a sure sign of hostility to religion.
Contempt | Fanaticism | Religion |
Kautilya, aka Chanakya or Vishnu Gupta NULL
The serpent, the king, the tiger, the stinging wasp, the small child, the dog owned by other people, and the fool: these seven ought not to be awakened from sleep.
Man |
Ban Zhao, courtesy name Huiban
With whole-hearted devotion to sew and to weave; to love not gossip and silly laughter; in cleanliness and order to prepare the wine and food for serving guests, may be called the characteristics of womanly work.
A composition which dazzles at first sight by gaudy epithets, or brilliant turns or expression, or glittering trains of imagery, may fade gradually from the mind, leaving no enduring impression; but words which flow fresh and warm from a full heart, and which are instinct with the life and breath of human feeling, pass into household memories, and partake of the immortality of the affections from which they spring.
All evil, in fact the very existence of evil, is inexplicable till we refer to the fatherhood of God. - It hangs a huge blot in the universe till the orb of divine love rises behind it. - In that we detect its meaning. - It appears to us but a finite shadow, as it passes across the disk of infinite light.
Man |
Those old ages are like the landscape that shows best in the purple distance, all verdant and smooth, and bathed in mellow light.
Ban Zhao, courtesy name Huiban
These four qualifications characterize the greatest virtue of a woman. No woman can afford to be without them. In fact they are very easy to possess if a woman only treasure them in her heart. The ancients had a saying: "Is love afar off? If I desire love, then love is at hand!" So can it be said of these qualifications.
Heaven | Honor | Husband | Important | Individual | Man | Wife | Yielding |