This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Arthur Conan Doyle, fully Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle
Dr. Munro, sir, said he, I am a walking museum. You could fit what ISN'T the matter with me on to the back of a ---- visiting card. If there's any complaint you want to make a special study of, just you come to me, sir, and see what I can do for you. It's not every one that can say that he has had cholera three times, and cured himself by living on red pepper and brandy.
Thérèse de Lisieux, fully Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. born Marie-Françoise-Thérèse Martin NULL
How sweet is the way of Love! True, one may fall, one may not be always faithful, but Love, knowing how to draw profit from all, very quickly consumes whatsoever may displease Jesus, leaving naught but humble and profound peace in the innermost soul.
Clement of Alexandria, originally Titus Flavius Clemens NULL
For what is hairy is by nature drier and warmer than what is bare; therefore, the male is hairier and more warm blooded than the female; the uncastrated, than the castrated; the mature than the immature
Isidore of Seville, fully Saint Isidore of Seville NULL
Many creatures go through a natural change and by decay pass into different forms, as bees [are formed] by the decaying flesh of calves, as beetles from horses, locusts from mules, scorpions from crabs.
Stanislaw Lec, fully Stanisław Jerzy Lec, born Baron Stanisław Jerzy de Tusch-Letz
Every now and then you meet a man whose ignorance is encyclopedic.
You can't express inspiration without skill.
Daring | Individual | Life | Life | People |
He hath willed everything that may be for our good, if we perform the condition he hath required; and hath put it upon record, that we may know it and regulate our desires and supplications according to it. If we will not seek him, his immutability cannot be a bar, but our own folly is the cause; and by our neglect we despoil him of this perfection as to us, and either imply that he is not sincere, and means not as he speaks; or that he is as changeable as the wind, sometimes this thing, sometimes that, and not at all to be confided in. If we ask according to his revealed will, the unchangeableness of his nature will assure us of the grant; and what a presumption would it be in a creature dependent upon his sovereign, to ask that which he knows he has declared his will against; since there is no good we can want, but he hath promised to give, upon our sincere and ardent desire for it.
Conquest | Doctrine | Folly | Illusion | Reason | Thought | Weakness | World | Thought |
Thomas Browne, fully Sir Thomas Browne
The world is not an inn, but a hospital, and a place, not to live, but to die in.
Will |
Every man is a missionary, now and forever, for good or for evil, whether he intends or designs it or not. He may be a blot, radiating his dark influence outward to the very circumference of society; or he may be a blessing, spreading benediction over the length and breadth of the world: but a blank he cannot be. There are no moral blanks; there are no neutral characters. We are either the sower that sows and corrupts, or the light that splendidly illuminates, and the salt that silently operates; but being dead or alive, every man speaks.
The difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit, to which another may not pretend as well as he.
Action | Body | Change | Day | Distinction | Imagination | Impression | Light | Man | Memory | Men | Noise | Object | Past | Present | Receive | Sense | Time |
A government regulating itself by what is wise and just for the many, uninfluenced by the local and selfish views of the few who direct their affairs, has not been seen, perhaps, on earth. Or if it existed for a moment at the birth of ours, it would not be easy to fix the term of its continuance. Still, I believe it does exist here in a greater degree than anywhere else; and for its growth and continuance... I offer sincere prayers.
Government | Government |
So bear in mind that majorities, especially respectable ones, are nine times out of ten in the wrong; and that if you see man or boy striving earnestly on the weak side, however wrong-headed or blundering he may be, you are not to go and join the cry against him. If you can't join him and help him, and make him wiser, at any rate remember that he has found something in the world which he will fight and suffer for.
Right |
The only thing to seek in contemplative prayer is God; and we seek Him successfully when we realize that we cannot find Him unless He shows Himself to us, and yet at the same time that He would not have inspired us to seek Him unless we had already found Him.
Do not be too quick to assume your enemy is a savage just because he is your enemy. Perhaps he is your enemy because he thinks you are a savage. Or perhaps he is afraid of you because he feels that you are afraid of him. And perhaps if he believed you are capable of loving him he would no longer be your enemy.
This whole attitude of abstraction, of hatred and denigration of the body, has finally led to a pathological and totally unrealistic obsession with bodily detail … [in consequence of which] love becomes no longer an expression of the communion between persons… Instead of saying that an act is pure when you remove all that is material, sensuous, fleshly, emotional, passionate, etc., from it, we will on the contrary say that a sexual act is pure when it gives a rightful place to the body, the senses, the emotions …, the special needs of the person, all that is called for by the unique relationship between the two lovers, and that is demanded by the situation in which they find themselves… It is precisely in this spirit of celebration, gratitude, and joy that true purity is found.
Freedom | Glory | God | Heart | Illusion | Liberty | Love | Means | Men | Mind | Order | Receive | Silence | God |
Everything wonderful in appearance has been ascribed to angels, to devils, or to saints. Everything ancient has some legendary tale annexed to it. The common operations of nature have not escaped their practice of corrupting everything.