This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Another doctrine repugnant to civil society, is that whatsoever a man does against his conscience, is sin; and it dependeth on the presumption of making himself judge of good and evil. For a man's conscience and his judgment are the same thing, and as the judgment, so also the conscience may be erroneous.
Anger | Beginning | Body | Cause | Desire | Dreams | Imagination | Kindness | Lying | Thought | Thought |
The division into whig and tory is founded in the nature of men; the weakly and nerveless, the rich and the corrupt, seeing more safety and accessibility in a strong executive; the healthy, firm, and virtuous, feeling confidence in their physical and moral resources, and willing to part with only so much power as is necessary for their good government; and, therefore, to retain the rest in the hands of the many, the division will substantially be into Whig and Tory.
Administration | Dignity | Government | People | Power | Society | Society | Government |
Thomas Mann, fully Paul Thomas Mann
We do not fear being called meticulous, inclining as we do to the view that only the exhaustive can be truly interesting.
The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to act. A general association takes place, and common interest produces common security.
Anger |
William Henley, fully William Ernest Henley
Double Ballade on the Nothingness of Things - The big teetotum twirls, And epochs wax and wane As chance subsides or swirls; But of the loss and gain The sum is always plain. Read on the mighty pall, The weed of funeral That covers praise and blame, The -isms and the -anities, Magnificence and shame:-- "O Vanity of Vanities!" The Fates are subtle girls! They give us chaff for grain. And Time, the Thunderer, hurls, Like bolted death, disdain At all that heart and brain Conceive, or great or small, Upon this earthly ball. Would you be knight and dame? Or woo the sweet humanities? Or illustrate a name? O Vanity of Vanities! We sound the sea for pearls, Or drown them in a drain; We flute it with the merles, Or tug and sweat and strain; We grovel, or we reign; We saunter, or we brawl; We search the stars for Fame, Or sink her subterranities; The legend's still the same:-- "O Vanity of Vanities!" Here at the wine one birls, There some one clanks a chain. The flag that this man furls That man to float is fain. Pleasure gives place to pain: These in the kennel crawl, While others take the wall. She has a glorious aim, He lives for the inanities. What come of every claim? O Vanity of Vanities! Alike are clods and earls. For sot, and seer, and swain, For emperors and for churls, For antidote and bane, There is but one refrain: But one for king and thrall, For David and for Saul, For fleet of foot and lame, For pieties and profanities, The picture and the frame:-- "O Vanity of Vanities!" Life is a smoke that curls-- Curls in a flickering skein, That winds and whisks and whirls, A figment thin and vain, Into the vast Inane. One end for hut and hall! One end for cell and stall! Burned in one common flame Are wisdoms and insanities. For this alone we came:-- "O Vanity of Vanities!" Envoy Prince, pride must have a fall. What is the worth of all Your state's supreme urbanities? Bad at the best's the game. Well might the Sage exclaim:-- "O Vanity of Vanities!"
W. H. Auden, fully Wystan Hugh Auden
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well That, for all they care, I can go to hell, But on earth indifference is the least We have to dread from man or beast. How should we like it were stars to burn With a passion for us we could not return? If equal affection cannot be, Let the more loving one be me. Admirer as I think I am Of stars that do not give a damn, I cannot, now I see them, say I missed one terribly all day. Were all stars to disappear or die, I should learn to look at an empty sky And feel its total dark sublime, Though this might take me a little time.
Anger | Culture | Enlightenment | Error | Evil | Happy | Language | Love | Music | Public | Speech | Strength | Will | Woman | World | Afraid |
Will Rogers, fully William Penn Adair "Will" Rogers
Rotation of crops and less automobiles will relieve the farmers whenever they decide to try it.
Feeling good and feeling bad are not necessarily opposites. Both at least involve feelings. Any feeling is a reminder of life. The worst 'feeling' evidently is non-feeling.
Whitney Young, fully Whitney Moore Young, Jr.
You can holler, protest, march, picket and demonstrate, but somebody must be able to sit in on the strategy conferences and plot a course. There must be strategies, the researchers, the professionals to carry out the program. That's our role.
Dignity |
Whitney Young, fully Whitney Moore Young, Jr.
Support the strong, give courage to the timid, remind the indifferent, and warn the opposed.
Dignity |
If "freedom" means, first of all, the responsibility of every individual for the rational determination of his own personal, professional and social existence, then there is no greater fear than that of the establishment of general freedom. Without a thoroughgoing solution of this problem there never will be a peace lasting longer than one or two generations. To solve this problem on a social scale, it will take more thinking, more honesty and decency, more conscientiousness, more economic, social and educational changes in social mass living than all the efforts made in previous and future wars and post-war reconstruction programs taken together.
Ability | Anger | Deviation | Education | Fighting | Health | Joy | Love | Pain | People | Pleasure | Truth | World |
Walt Whitman, fully Walter "Walt" Whitman
The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage is closed and done. From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won. Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells; but I with mournful tread walk the deck my captain lies, fallen cold and dead.
Dignity | Individual | Law | Liberty | Man | Purpose | Purpose | Wise |
Walt Whitman, fully Walter "Walt" Whitman
The greatest city is that which has the greatest men and women.
Cruelty is no more the cure of crimes than it is the cure of sufferings. Compassion in the first instance is good for both; I have known it to bring compunction when nothing else would.
Anger |