This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
It is a good thing to be rich and strong, but it is a better thing to be loved.
Today not even a universal fire could make the torrential poetic production of our time disappear. But it is exactly a question of production, that is, of hand-made products which are subject to the laws of taste and fashion.
Eugenio Maria de Hostos (y Bonilla)
Slavery has as many shapes among us as there are things we need.
At the inner circle of the disciples and friends of the Cross - composed mostly of men representing the official culture (school, universities, academies) I never belonged. But instead, I breathed the air of other environments where the teaching of the Cross had penetrated inland perhaps indirect.
Oh, say, how call ye this, To face, and smile, the comrade whom his kiss Betrayed? Scorn? Insult? Courage? None of these: 'tis but of all man's inward sicknesses the vilest, that he knoweth not of shame nor pity! Yet I praise him that he came . . . to me it shall bring comfort, once to clear my heart on thee, and thou shalt wince to hear.
Evelyn Glennie, fully Evelyn Elizabeth Ann Glennie
The thing about playing percussion is that you can create all these emotions that can be sometimes beautiful, sometimes really ugly, or sometimes sweet, sometimes as big as King Kong and so on. And so there can be a real riot out there, or it can be so refined.
And so we take a holiday, a vacation, to gain release from this bondage for a space, to stand back from the rush of things and breathe again. But a holiday is a respite, not a cure. The more we need holidays, the more certain it is that the disease has conquered us and not we it. More and more holidays just to get away from it all is a sure sign of a decaying civilization; it was one of the most obvious marks of the breakdown of the Roman empire. It is a symptom that we haven't learned how to live so as to re-create ourselves in our work instead of being sapped by it. A car should always be charging its battery as it runs. If it simply uses up without putting back, it has to go into dock to be recharged. It is not a sign that we are running particularly well if we are constantly needing to go into dock.
Evil | Extreme | Love | Object | Time | Truth | Vision | World |
Many people seem to think that the spiritual life necessarily requires a definite and exacting plan of study. It does not. But it does require a definite plan of life; and courage in sticking to the plan, not for merely days or weeks, but for years.
Angels | Beauty | Church | Ends | Little | Universe | Worship | Beauty |
Love... makes the whole difference between an execution and a martyrdom.
If you have made a decision, and you still feel, taking it all in all, it was the right one, then don't look over your shoulder on what might have been. If it was wrong, ask for forgiveness and accept the present consequences, happily and without remorse. Nothing is more corrosive of the powers you should be using to meet the present.
Evelyn Waugh, fully Evelyn Arthur St. John Waugh
It was dead contrary to the common experience of such encounters, when time is found to have built its own defensive lines, camouflaged vulnerable points, and laid a field of mines across all but a few well-trodden paths, so that, more often than not, we can only signal to one another from either side of the tangle of wire.
Evelyn Waugh, fully Evelyn Arthur St. John Waugh
You have no idea how much nastier I would be if I was not a Catholic. Without supernatural aid, I would hardly be a human being.
As the genuine religious impulse becomes dominant, adoration more and more takes charge. I come to seek God because I need Him, may be an adequate formula for prayer. I come to adore His splendor, and fling myself and all that I have at His feet, is the only possible formula for worship.
Evelyn Waugh, fully Evelyn Arthur St. John Waugh
As there was no form of government common to the peoples thus segregated, nor tie of language, history, habit, or belief, they were called a Republic.