This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Ayn Rand, born Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum
Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all.
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield
Knowledge of mankind is knowledge of their passions.
Bhagavad Gītā, simply known as Gita NULL
The wise see knowledge and action as one; they see truly.
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
Happiness [is] an effect and knowledge a mere instrument of successful activity.
Bhagavad Gītā, simply known as Gita NULL
The raft of knowledge ferries the worst sinner to safety.
Those whom we call ancients were in truth new in every respect, and actually formed the childhood of man; and since we have added to their knowledge the experience of the succeeding centuries, it is in ourselves that that antiquity can be found which we revere in others.
Antiquity | Childhood | Experience | Knowledge | Man | Respect | Truth |
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
All knowledge must be built on intuitive beliefs; if they are rejected, nothing is left.
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
Almost all education has a political motive: It aims at strengthening some group, national or religious or even social, in the competition with other groups. It is the motive, in the main, which determines the subjects taught, the knowledge offered and the knowledge withheld, and also decides what mental habits the pupils are expected to acquire. Hardly anything is done to foster the inward growth of mind and spirit; in fact, those who have most education are very often atrophied in their mental and spiritual life.
Aims | Competition | Education | Growth | Knowledge | Life | Life | Mind | Spirit |
By mysticism we mean, not the extravagance of erring fancy, but the concentration of reason in feeling, the enthusiastic love of good, the true, the one, the sense of infinity of knowledge and of the marvel of the human faculties.
Extravagance | Good | Knowledge | Love | Mysticism | Reason | Sense |
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
The pursuit of knowledge is, I think, mainly actuated by love of power.
Ramana Maharshi, fully Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi
The path of Knowledge is only to dive inward with the mind, not uttering the word ‘I’, and to question whence, as ‘I’, it rises. To meditate ‘This is not I’ or ‘That I am’ may be an aid, but you can it form the enquiry? When the mind, inwardly enquiring, ‘Who am I?’ attains the heart, something of Itself manifests as ‘I-I’, so that the individual ‘I’ must bow in shame. Though manifesting, it is not ’I’ by nature by Perfection, and this is the Self.
Aid | Heart | Individual | Knowledge | Mind | Nature | Perfection | Question | Self | Shame |
Men despise religion; they hate it and fear it is true. To remedy this, we must begin by showing that religion is not contrary to reason; that it is venerable, to inspire respect for it; then we must make it lovable, to make good men hope it is true; finally, we must prove it is true. Venerable, because it has perfect knowledge of man; lovable because it promises the true good.
Despise | Fear | Good | Hate | Hope | Knowledge | Man | Men | Reason | Religion | Respect | Respect |
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
History is invaluable in increasing our knowledge of human nature because it shows how people may be expected to behave in new situations. Many prominent men and women are completely ordinary in character, and only exceptional in their circumstances.
Character | Circumstances | History | Human nature | Knowledge | Men | Nature | People |
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
We know very little, and yet it is astonishing that we know so much, and still more astonishing that so little knowledge can give us so much power.