This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Lord Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Real merit of any kind cannot long be concealed; it will be discovered, and nothing can depreciate it, but a man’s exhibiting it himself. It may not always be rewarded as it ought; but it will always be known.
The way of this world is to praise dead saints and persecute living ones.
Man little knows what calamities are beyond his patience to bear till he tries them; as in ascending the heights of ambition, which look bright from below, every step we rise shows us some new and gloomy prospect of hidden disappointment; so in our descent from the summits of pleasure, though the vale of misery below may appear, at first, dark and gloomy, yet the busy mind, still attentive to its own amusement, finds, as we descend, something to flatter and to please. Still as we approach, the darkest objects appear to brighten, and the mortal eye becomes adapted to its gloomy situation.
Ambition | Little | Man | Mind | Mortal | Patience | Pleasure |
“Every morning of the world I give thanks for all the wonderful things in my life,” declared a young man enthusiastically. “And do you know something? It’s strange indeed, but the more I give thanks, the more I have reason to be thankful. For, you see, blessings just pile up on me one after another like nobody’s business”... The more you practice the art of thankfulness, the more you have to be thankful for... The attitude of gratitude revitalizes the entire mental process by activating all other attitudes, thus stimulating creativity... Remember that praise and thanksgiving are the most powerful prayers of all.
Art | Blessings | Business | Creativity | Gratitude | Life | Life | Man | Practice | Praise | Reason | Thankfulness | World | Art |
It is not a merit to tolerate, but rather a crime to be intolerant.
Plutarch, named Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus after becoming Roman citizen NULL
Those who are greedy of praise prove that they are poor in merit.
Plutarch, named Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus after becoming Roman citizen NULL
If our own conscience protests and refuses to accept praise then it is proof against the flatterer.
Conscience | Need | Praise | World |
It’s about whether we’re going to be able to look forward to our descendants and hand this world over to them in much better shape, so they will look back on us with kindness and with praise – rather than cursing us for our apathy, or our narcissism, or our refusal to stand up tall for justice and freedom in the world.
Apathy | Better | Freedom | Justice | Kindness | Praise | Will | World |
R. G. Collingwood, fully Robert George Collingwood
In the later nineteenth century the idea of progress became almost an article of faith. This conception was a piece of sheer metaphysics derived from evolutionary naturalism and foisted upon history by the temper of the age.
A man is known by the books he reads, by the company he keeps, by the praise he gives, by his dress, by his tastes, by his distastes, by the stories he tells, by his gait, by the motion of his eye, by the look of his house, of his chamber; for nothing on earth is solitary, but everything hath affinities infinite.
Of cheerfulness, or a good temper - the more it is spent, the more of it remains.
Cheerfulness | Good | Temper |
Perpetual moderness is the measure of merit in every work of art.
Of cheerfulness or a good temper - the more it is spent, the more of it remains.
Cheerfulness | Good | Temper |
Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence.
Ability | Confidence | Education | Self | Self-confidence | Temper |