This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Since things that are found in the soul are of three kinds - passions, faculties, states of character, virtue must be one of these. By passions I mean appetite, anger, fear, confidence, envy, joy, friendly feeling, hatred, longing, emulation, pity, and in general the feelings that are accompanied by pleasure or pain; by faculties the things in virtue of which we are said to be capable of feeling these, for example, of becoming angry or being pained or feeling pity; by states of character the things in virtue of which we stand well or badly with reference to the passions, for example, with reference to anger we stand badly if we feel it violently or too weakly, and well if we feel it moderately; and similarly with reference to the other passions. Now neither the virtues nor the vices are passions, because we are not called good or bad on the ground of our virtues and our vices, and because we are neither praised nor blamed for our passions (for the man who feels fear or anger is not praised, nor is the man who simply feels anger blamed, but the man who feels it in a certain way), but for our virtues and our vices we are praised or blamed.
Anger | Appetite | Character | Confidence | Envy | Example | Fear | Feelings | Good | Joy | Longing | Man | Pain | Pity | Pleasure | Soul | Virtue | Virtue |
Style is the physiognomy of the mind, and a safer index to character than the face.
If you begin the day with love in your heart, peace in your nerves, and truth in your mind, you not only benefit by their presence but also bring them to others, to your family and friends, and to all those whose destiny draws across your path that day.
Day | Destiny | Family | Heart | Love | Mind | Peace | Truth |
Men best show their character in trifles, where they are not on guard. It is in insignificant matters, and in the simplest habits, that we often see the boundless egotism which pays no regard to the feelings of others, and denies nothing to itself.
There is no more important element in the formation of a virtuous character than a rightly directed sense of pleasure and dislike; for pleasure and pain are coextensive with life, and they exercise a powerful influence in promoting virtue and happiness in life.
Character | Important | Influence | Life | Life | Pain | Pleasure | Sense | Virtue | Virtue | Happiness |
Personality has the power to open many doors, but character must keep them open.
Character | Personality | Power |
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield
Patriotism depends as much on mutual suffering as on mutual success; and it is by that experience of all fortunes and all feelings that a great national character is created.
Character | Experience | Feelings | Patriotism | Success | Suffering |
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield
Self-love is a principle of action; but among no class of human beings has nature so profusely distributed this principle of life and action as through the whole sensitive family of genius.
Action | Family | Genius | Life | Life | Love | Nature | Self | Self-love |
Fame is what you have taken, character is what you give. When to this truth you awaken, then you begin to live.
Marriage is a great institution, and no family should be without it.
Claude Montefiore, fully Claude Joseph Goldsmid "C.G." Montefiore
Character is shaped by deeds, and character is partly habit.