This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, Commonly called Alfred Lord Tennyson
More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of. Wherefore let thy voice rise like a fountain for me night and day. For what are men better than sheeps or goats that nourish a blind life within the brain, if, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer both for themselves and those who call them friend? For so the whole round earth is every way bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
Better | Dreams | Earth | Gold | Knowing | Life | Life | Men | Prayer | Wisdom | World |
Alexis de Tocqueville, fully Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasure. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the public treasure, with the result that a democracy collapses over loose fiscal policy.
Democracy | Government | Majority | Policy | Public | Wisdom |
Paul Valéry, fully Ambroise-Paul-Toussaint-Jules Valéry
The majority of those who flatter themselves on their knowledge of the human heart do not separate their boasted insight from their unfavorable feeling about humanity... Nothing indeed imparts a psychological air so much as an habitual attitude of depreciation.
Heart | Humanity | Insight | Knowledge | Majority | Nothing | Wisdom |
H. G. Wells, fully Herbert George Wells
Religions are such stuff as dreams are made of.
Alexis de Tocqueville, fully Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
Eager and apprehensive men of small property constitute the class that is constantly increased by the equality of conditions. Hence in democratic communities the majority of the people do not clearly see what they have to gain by a revolution, but they continually and in a thousand ways feel that they might lose by one.
Equality | Majority | Men | People | Property | Revolution | Wisdom |
We have in dreams no true perception of time - a strange property of mind ! - for if such be also its property when entered into the eternal disembodied state, time will appear to us eternity! The relations of space as well as of time are also annihilated, so that while almost an eternity is compressed into a moment, infinite space is traversed more swiftly than by real thought.
Dreams | Eternal | Eternity | Mind | Perception | Property | Space | Thought | Time | Will | Wisdom |
A highly evolved use of intuition is being able to find meaning in symbols and synchronicities. The more we focus on finding meaning for ourselves in “chance occurrences,” the more we increase our intuitive power. Deepening our connection to our current surrounding increases our ability to follow the guidance of our inner purpose.
Ability | Chance | Focus | Guidance | Intuition | Meaning | Power | Purpose | Purpose | Guidance |
Erma Bombeck, fully Erma Louise Bombeck, born Erma Fiste
It takes a lot of courage to show your dreams to someone else.
Walt Whitman, fully Walter "Walt" Whitman
The poet is the equable man, not in him but off from him things are grotesque, eccentric, fail of their full returns, nothing out of its place is good, nothing in its place is bad, he bestows on every object or quality its fit proportion, neither more nor less, he is the arbiter of the diverse, he is the key... As he sees the farthest he has the most faith, his thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things, in the dispute on God and eternity he is silent, he sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and denouement, he sees eternity in men and women, he does not see men and women as dreams or dots.
Dispute | Dreams | Eternity | Faith | God | Good | Man | Men | Nothing | Object | Play | Praise | Wisdom | God |
The purpose of the past: to give us pleasant memories, wisdom and lessons to learn, not endless regrets. The purpose of the future: to give us hope and motivation and a place for our dreams. To warn us of possible risks, not for needless worry. The purpose of the present: to help us grow by applying the lessons from our past. To enjoy and appreciate the gift and beauty of life. To do what is necessary to make our dreams come true. To heed the warnings coming from our future.
Beauty | Dreams | Future | Hope | Life | Life | Past | Present | Purpose | Purpose | Wisdom | Worry | Beauty |
Every one of us is endowed at birth with all sorts of magnificent possibilities and potentialities. There is a capacity for idealism, a yearning for truth and beauty and nobility, a sensitivity to the hurt of others and to the dreams and needs of our fellow man. In the hopeful dawn of youth we feel these stirrings within us and we promise to bring them to life. And yet so often as the years pass by we permit these promises to be swept under the rug of expediency. We chalk them up to immaturity and we go on to live “more realistically.”
Beauty | Birth | Capacity | Dawn | Dreams | Idealism | Life | Life | Man | Nobility | Promise | Truth | Youth | Youth | Beauty |
Emil Gutheil, fully Emil Arthur Gutheil
[A] remarkably close relation… exists between humanity’s dreams and humanity’s religions.
Hold fast to dreams. For when dreams go, life is a barren field frozen with snow.