This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The primal principle of democracy is the worth and dignity of the individual
David Eli Lilienthal, "Mr. TVA"
The essential ingredient of democracy is not doctrine but intelligence, not authority but reason, not cynicism but faith in men, faith in God. Our strength lies in the fearless pursuit of truth by the minds of men who are free.
Authority | Cynicism | Democracy | Doctrine | Faith | God | Intelligence | Men | Reason | Strength | Truth |
David Bohm, fully David Joseph Bohm
The subtle is what is basic and the manifest is its result. The subtler has power to transform the gross but not vice versa.
Edith Sitwell, fully Dame Edith Louisa Sitwell
Good taste is the worst vice ever invented.
David Grayson, pseudonym of Ray Stannard Baker
Of all obstacles to that complete democracy of which we dream, is there a greater than property?
Eugène Ionesco, born Eugen Ionescu
No society has been able to abolish human sadness, no political system can deliver us from the pain of living, from our fear of death, our thirst for the absolute. It is the human condition that directs the social condition, not vice versa.
I strongly believe that education is the best means for people to progress in life. It gives people many, many choices for the kind of life they want to live, and the kind of lifestyle they want to have. But more importantly I think – and it’s a cliché, but it’s true – a well-educated society maintains a rich democracy. When our society is not well educated, democracy suffers. The other reason that I strongly support public education is that it is the best means for people who come from poor economic background to escape poverty. The obstacles are greater, but at least the opportunities are there. Education helps to level the playing field.
Democracy | Education | Life | Life | Means | People | Progress | Public | Reason | Society | Society | Think |
George Marshall, fully George Catlett Marshall, Jr.
We must present democracy as a force holding within itself the seeds of unlimited progress by the human race. By our actions we should make it clear that such a democracy is a means to a better way of life, together with a better understanding among nations. Tyranny inevitably must retire before the tremendous moral strength of the gospel of freedom and self-respect for the individual, but we have to recognize that these democratic principles do not flourish on empty stomachs, and that people turn to false promises of dictators because they are hopeless and anything promises something better than the miserable existence that they endure. However, material assistance alone is not sufficient. The most important thing for the world today in my opinion is a spiritual regeneration which would reestablish a feeling of good faith among men generally. Discouraged people are in sore need of the inspiration of great principles. Such leadership can be the rallying point against intolerance, against distrust, against that fatal insecurity that leads to war. It is to be hoped that the democratic nations can provide the necessary leadership.
Better | Democracy | Existence | Faith | Force | Freedom | Good | Important | Insecurity | Inspiration | Means | Men | Nations | Need | Opinion | People | Present | Principles | Progress | Strength | Tyranny | Understanding | World | Leadership |
Richard Niebuhr, fully Helmut Richard Niebuhr
Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.
Capacity | Democracy | Inclination | Injustice | Injustice | Justice |
If a man went simply by what he saw, he might be tempted to affirm that the essence of democracy is melodrama.
Ida Tarbell, fully Ida Minerva Tarbell
Perhaps our national ambition to standardize ourselves has behind it the notion that democracy means standardization. But standardization is the surest way to destroy the initiative, to benumb the creative impulse above all else essential to the vitality and growth of democratic ideals.
Ambition | Democracy | Destroy | Growth | Impulse | Means | Standardization | Ambition |
Jayaprakash Narayan, known as JP Narayan, Jayaprakash or Loknayak
If you really care for freedom, liberty, There cannot be any democracy or liberal institution without politics. The only true antidote to the perversions of politics is more politics and better politics. Not negation of politics.
We slowly learn that life consists of processes as well as results, and that failure may come quite as easily from ignoring the adequacy of one's method as from selfish or ignoble aims. We are thus brought to a conception of Democracy not merely as a sentiment which desires the well-being of all [people], nor yet as a creed which believes in the essential dignity and equality of all [people], but as that which affords a rule for living as well as a test of faith.
Creed | Democracy | Dignity | Equality | Failure | Life | Life | Method | Rule | Sentiment | Failure | Learn |
Loud indignation against vice often stands for virtue with bigots.
Indignation | Virtue | Virtue | Vice |