This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
André Gide, fully André Paul Guillaume Gide
Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
We may doubt the existence of matter, if we please, and like Berkeley deny it, without subjecting ourselves to the shame of a very conclusive confutation; but there is this remarkable difference between matter and mind, that he that doubts the existence of mind, by doubting proves it.
Doubt is the vestibule which all must pass before they can enter the temple of wisdom. When we are in doubt and puzzle out the truth by our own exertions, we have gained something that will stay by us and will serve us again. But if to avoid the trouble of the search we avail ourselves of the superior information of a friend, such knowledge will not remain with us; we have not bought, but borrowed it.
Doubt | Friend | Knowledge | Search | Truth | Will | Wisdom | Trouble |
Dale Carnegie, originally spelled Dale Carnegey
I know with a conviction beyond all doubt that the biggest problem you and I have to deal with - in fact, almost the only problem we have to deal with - is choosing the right thoughts. If we can do that, we will be on the highroad to solving all our problems.
Dale Carnegie, originally spelled Dale Carnegey
Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.
Jealousy lives upon doubts. It becomes madness or ceases entirely as soon as we pass from doubt to certainty.
Henrik Ibsen, aka Henrik Johan Ibsen
If you doubt yourself, then indeed you stand on shaky ground.
Doubt |
Not only are moral laws with their principles essentially distinguished from every other kind of practical knowledge in which there is anything empirical, but all moral philosophy rests wholly on its pure part. When applied to man, it does not borrow the least thing from the knowledge of man himself (anthropology), but gives laws a priori to him as a rational being. No doubt these laws require a judgment sharpened by experience, in order on the one hand to distinguish in what cases they are applicable, and on the other to procure for them access to the will of the man and effectual influence on conduct; since man is acted on by so many inclinations that, though capable of the idea of a practical pure reason, he is not so easily able to make it effective in concreto in his life.
Conduct | Distinguish | Doubt | Experience | Influence | Judgment | Knowledge | Life | Life | Man | Order | Philosophy | Principles | Reason | Will |
James Froude, fully James Anthony Froude
Philosophy goes no further than probabilities, and in every assertion keeps doubt in reserve.
Assertion | Doubt | Philosophy | Reserve |
John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury, 4th Baronet, Sir John Lubbock
Religion is full of difficulties, but if we are often puzzled what to think, we need seldom be in doubt what to do.
There can be no doubt but that everything in the world, by the beauty of its order, and the evidence of a determinate and beneficial purpose which pervades its, testifies that some supreme efficient Power must have pre-existed, by which the whole was ordained for a specific end.
Beauty | Doubt | Evidence | Order | Power | Purpose | Purpose | World | Beauty |
John W. Gardner, fully John William Gardner
Creativity requires the freedom to consider "unthinkable" alternatives, to doubt the worth of cherished practices. Every organization, every society is under the spell of assumptions so familiar that they are never questioned, least of all by those most intimately involved.
Creativity | Doubt | Freedom | Organization | Society | Worth | Society |
Human beings are perhaps never more frightening than when they are convinced beyond doubt that they are right.
I believe that the first test of a truly great man is his humility. I do not mean by humility, doubt of his own powers. But really great men have a curious feeling that the greatness is not in them, but through them. And they see something divine in every other man.