This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
George Marshall, fully George Catlett Marshall, Jr.
We have walked blindly, ignoring the lessons of the past, with, in our century, the tragic consequences of two world wars and the Korean struggle as a result.
Consequences | Struggle | World |
If men are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a matter which may involve the most serious and alarming consequences that can invite the consideration of mankind, reason is of no use to us; the freedom of speech may be taken away, and dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.
Consequences | Consideration | Freedom of speech | Freedom | Men | Reason | Speech |
George Marshall, fully George Catlett Marshall, Jr.
I need not tell you that the world situation is very serious. That must be apparent to all intelligent people. I think one difficulty is that the problem is one of such enormous complexity that the very mass of facts presented to the public by press and radio make it exceedingly difficult for the man in the street to reach a clear appraisement of the situation. Furthermore, the people of this country are distant from the troubled areas of the earth and it is hard for them to comprehend the plight and consequent reactions of the long-suffering peoples, and the effect of those reactions on their governments in connection with our efforts to promote peace in the world.
Difficulty | Earth | Man | Need | Peace | People | Public | World | Think |
Richard Niebuhr, fully Helmut Richard Niebuhr
All human sin seems so much worse in its consequences than in its intentions.
Consequences | Sin |
Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke
It is a very easy thing to devise good laws; the difficulty is to make them effective. The great mistake is that of looking upon men as virtuous, or thinking that they can be made so by laws; and consequently the greatest art of a politician is to render vices serviceable to the cause of virtue.
Art | Cause | Difficulty | Good | Men | Mistake | Thinking | Art |
The difficulty is not that great to die for a friend, the hard part is finding a friend worth dying for.
Difficulty | Friend | Worth |
Huston Smith, fully Huston Cummings Smith
The only thing that continues is the consequences of our action.
Time is but the measure of the difficulty of a conception. Pure thought has scarcely any need of time, since it perceives the two ends of an idea almost at the same moment.
Difficulty | Ends | Need | Thought | Thought |
J. P. Morgan, fully John Pierpont Morgan
No problem can be solved until it is reduced to some simple form. The changing of a vague difficulty into a specific, concrete form is a very essential element in thinking.
If we would have civilization and the exertion indispensable to its success, we must have property; if we have property, we must have its rights; if we have the rights of property, we must take those consequences of the rights of property which are inseparable from the rights themselves.
Civilization | Consequences | Indispensable | Property | Rights |
Hope is a vigorous principle; it is furnished with light and heat to advise and execute; it sets the head and heart to work, and animates a man to do his utmost. And thus, by perpetually pushing and assurance, it puts a difficulty out of countenance, and makes a seeming impossibility give way.
Difficulty | Heart | Impossibility | Light | Man |
For, as I have suggested, disruption of the unity of the self is not limited to the cases that come to physicians and institutions for treatment. They accompany every disturbance of normal relations of husband and wife, parent and child, group and group, class and class, nation and nation. Emotional responses are so total as compared with the partial nature of intellectual responses, of ideas and abstract conceptions, that their consequences are more pervasive and enduring. I can, accordingly, think of nothing of greater practical importance than the psychic effects of human relationships, normal and abnormal, should be the object of continues study, including among the consequences the indirect somatic effects.
Abstract | Consequences | Husband | Ideas | Nature | Nothing | Object | Self | Unity | Parent | Think |
Openness of mind means accessibility of mind to any and every consideration that will throw light upon the situation that needs to be cleared up, and that will help determine the consequences of acting this way or that. Efficiency in accomplishing ends which have been settled upon as unalterable can coexist with a narrowly opened mind. But intellectual growth means constant expansion of horizons and consequent formation of new purposes and new responses. These are impossible without an active disposition to welcome points of view hitherto alien; an active desire to entertain considerations which modify existing purposes. Retention of capacity to grow is the reward of such intellectual hospitality. The worst thing about stubbornness of mind, about prejudices, is that they arrest development; they shut off the mind from new stimuli. Open-mindedness means retention of the childlike attitude; closed-mindedness means premature intellectual old age.
Capacity | Consequences | Consideration | Desire | Efficiency | Ends | Growth | Light | Means | Mind | Reward | Will | Old |
John Hersey, fully John Richard Hersey
The crux of the matter is whether total war in its present form is justifiable, even when it serves a just purpose. Does it not have material and spiritual evil as its consequences which far exceed whatever good might result? When will our moralists give us an answer to this question?
When you delegate a task to your people, make a point to help them capture your vision for what the completed task will look like. Hold your people accountable to a measurable standard of excellence, and make rewards and consequences a part of enforcing the standard. Give your people full responsibility (ownership) for the completion of specific tasks and the prospect of sharing in the rewards that result.
Consequences | People | Responsibility | Vision | Will |
Faced with the admitted difficulty of managing the creative process, we are doubling our efforts to do so. Is this because science has failed to deliver, having given us nothing more than nuclear power, penicillin, space travel, genetic engineering, transistors, and superconductors? Or is it because governments everywhere regard as a reproach activities they cannot advantageously control? They felt that way about the marketplace for goods, but trillions of wasted dollars later, they have come to recognize the efficiency of this self-regulating system. Not so, however, with the marketplace for ideas.
Difficulty | Efficiency | Nothing | Regard | Science | Space |
The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping from old ones.
Difficulty | Ideas | Old |
John W. Gardner, fully John William Gardner
We pay a heavy price for our fear of failure. It is a powerful obstacle to growth. It assures the progressive narrowing of the personality and prevents exploration and experimentation. There is no learning without some difficulty and fumbling. If you want to keep on learning, you must keep on risking failure all your life.
Difficulty | Failure | Fear | Learning | Personality | Price | Failure | Obstacle |
Shouldn't we also ask ourselves what the consequences are of scrambling to provide the "most" of everything to our children in a world of fast dwindling resources?
Children | Consequences | World |