This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Eugene McCarthy, fully Eugene Joseph "Gene" McCarthy
Conspicuous waste beyond the imagination of Thorstein Veblen has become the mark of American life. As a nation we find ourselves overbuilt, if not overhoused; overfed, although millions of poor people are undernourished; overtransported in overpowered cars; and also... overdefended or overdefensed.
Auguste Rodin, fully François-Auguste-René Rodin
Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.
Experience | Nothing | Time | Waste | Wisdom |
No hour is to be considered a waste which teaches one what not to do.
John B. Tabb, fully John Banister Tabb
Every year that I live I am more convinced that the waste of life lies in the love we have not given, the powers we have not given, the power we have not used, the selfish prudence which will risk nothing, and which, shirking pain, misses happiness as well.
Life | Life | Love | Nothing | Pain | Power | Prudence | Prudence | Risk | Waste | Will | Wisdom | Happiness |
Alexis de Tocqueville, fully Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
Amid the ruins which surround me I shall dare to say that revolutions are not what I most fear for coming generations?... It is believed by some that modern society will be always changing its aspect; for myself, I fear that it will ultimately be too invariably fixed in the same institutions, the same prejudices, the same manners, so that mankind will be stopped and circumscribed; that the mind will swing backwards and forwards forever without begetting fresh ideas; that man will waste his strength in bootless and solitary trifling, and, though in continual motion, that humanity will cease to advance.
Fear | Humanity | Ideas | Man | Mankind | Manners | Mind | Society | Strength | Waste | Will | Wisdom | Society |
Every day I live I am more convinced that the waste of life lies in the love we have not given, the powers we have not used, the selfish prudence that will risk nothing and which, shirking pain, misses happiness as well.
Day | Life | Life | Love | Nothing | Pain | Prudence | Prudence | Risk | Waste | Will | Happiness |
A waste far more worthy of our tears is the enormous energy within us that never gets channeled, the love that is never expressed, the kindness that never surfaces, the compassion and tenderness that are never awakened.
Compassion | Energy | Kindness | Love | Tears | Tenderness | Waste |
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
The fountain of contentment must spring up in the mind. He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts and multiply the grief which he proposes to remove.
Contentment | Grief | Human nature | Knowledge | Life | Life | Little | Mind | Nature | Waste | Will | Happiness |
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts and multiply the grief which he proposes to remove.
Grief | Human nature | Knowledge | Life | Life | Little | Nature | Waste | Will | Happiness |
Laurence Olivier, fully Sir Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier
Don't waste your time striving for perfection, instead, strive for excellence -- doing your best.
Excellence | Perfection | Time | Waste | Excellence |
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, fully Sir or Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
If the great religions continue to waste their energies in a fratricidal war instead of looking upon themselves as friendly partners in the supreme task of nourishing the spiritual life of mankind, the swift advance of secular humanism and moral materialism is assured.
Lu Xun, or Lu Hsün, pen name of Zhou Shuren
I naturally believe there will be a future, but I do not waste my time imagining its radiant beauty… It seems tome that we ought to think first about the present. Even if the present is desperately dark, I do not wish to leave it. Will tomorrow be free from darkness? We’ll talk about that tomorrow.
Beauty | Darkness | Future | Present | Time | Tomorrow | Waste | Will | Think |
Jackie Gleason, born John Herbert Gleason
The greatest waste of money is to keep it.