This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The golden age is not in the past, but in the future: not in the origin of human experience, but in its consummate flower: not opening in Eden, but out from Gethsemane.
Age | Character | Experience | Future | Past |
Thought precedes the will to think, and error lives ere reason can be born. Reason, the power to guess at right and wrong, the twinkling lamp of wand'ring life, that winks and wakes by turns fooling the follower 'twixt shade and shining.
Character | Error | Power | Reason | Right | Thought | Will | Wisdom |
Contempt of all outward things that come in competition with duty fulfills the ideal of human greatness. It is sanctioned by conscience, that universal and eternal lawgiver, whose chief principle is, that everything must be yielded up for right.
Character | Competition | Conscience | Contempt | Duty | Eternal | Greatness | Right |
By moral power we mean the power of a life and a character, the power of good and great purposes, the power which comes at length to reside in a man distinguished in some course of estimable or great conduct. No other power of man compares with this, and there is no individual who may not be measurably invested with it.
Character | Conduct | Good | Individual | Life | Life | Man | Power |
The world is governed much more by opinion than by laws. It is not the judgment of courts, but the moral judgment of individuals and masses of men, which is the chief wall of defence around property and life. With the progress of society, this power of opinion is taking the place of arms.
Character | Judgment | Life | Life | Men | Opinion | Power | Progress | Property | Society | World |
When the great finals come, each one of us will be asked five questions: First: What did you accomplish in the world with the power that God gave you? Second: How did you help your neighbor and what did you do for those in need? Third: What did you do to serve God? Fourth: What did you leave in the world that was worth while when you came from it? Last: What did you bring into this world which will be of use here?
Character | God | Need | Power | Will | World | Worth | God |
It is a welcome symptom in an age which is commonly denounced as materialistic, that it makes heroes of men whose goals lie wholly in the intellectual and moral sphere. This proves that knowledge and justice are ranked above wealth and power by a large section of the human race.
Age | Character | Goals | Human race | Justice | Knowledge | Men | Power | Race | Wealth |
Charles Alexander Eastman, first named Ohiyesa
The first American mingled with her pride a singular humility. Spiritual arrogance was foreign to his nature and teaching. He never claimed that his power of articulate speech was proof of superiority over “dumb creation”; on the other hand, speech to him is a perilous gift. He believes profoundly in silence - the sign of perfect equilibrium. silence is the absolute poise or balance of body, mind and spirit. The an who preserves his selfhood ever calm and unshaken by the storms of existence - not a leaf, as it were, astir on the tree, not a ripple upon the surface of the shining pool - his, in the mind of the unlettered sage, is the ideal attitude and conduct of life.
Absolute | Arrogance | Balance | Body | Character | Conduct | Existence | Humility | Life | Life | Mind | Nature | Power | Pride | Silence | Speech | Spirit | Superiority |
The essential problem of freedom, it seems to me, is the problem of the relation of choice and unimpeded effective action to each other... There is an intrinsic connection between choice as freedom and power of action as freedom. A choice which intelligently manifests individuality enlarges the range of action, and this enlargement in turn confers upon our desires greater insight and foresight, and makes choice more intelligent.
Action | Character | Choice | Foresight | Freedom | Individuality | Insight | Power |
Exaggerated respect for athletics, an excess of coarse impressions brought about by the technical discoveries of recent years, the increased severity of the struggle for existence due to the economic crisis, the brutalization of political life: all these factors are hostile to the ripening of the character and the desire for real culture, and stamp our age as barbarous, materialistic and superficial.
Age | Athletics | Character | Culture | Desire | Excess | Existence | Life | Life | Respect | Struggle | Respect |
Any power must be an enemy of mankind which enslaves the individual by terror and force whether it arises under the Fascist or the Communist flag. All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded to the individual.
Character | Enemy | Force | Individual | Mankind | Opportunity | Power | Society | Terror | Society |
Every person in the world has it in him to become far more than he is... Great unused reservoirs of power lie buried deep within us all.