This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Poetry is enthusiasm with wings of fire; it is the angel of high thoughts, that inspires us with the power of sacrifice.
Character | Enthusiasm | Poetry | Power | Sacrifice |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
A soul guaranteed against prejudice is marvelously advanced toward tranquillity.
Character | Prejudice | Soul | Tranquility |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
The want of goods is easily repaired, but the poverty of the soul is irreparable.
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
Vice leaves repentance in the soul like an ulcer in the flesh, which is always scratching and lacerating itself; for reason effaces all other griefs and sorrows, but it begets that of repentance, which is so much the more grievous, by reason it springs within, as the cold and hot of fevers are more sharp than those that only strike upon the outward skin.
Character | Reason | Repentance | Soul |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
We are all of us richer than we think we are; but we are taught to borrow and to beg, and brought up more to make use of what is another’s than our own. Man can in nothing fix and conform himself to his mere necessity. Of pleasure, wealth and power he grasps at more than he can hold; his greediness is incapable of moderation.
Character | Man | Moderation | Necessity | Nothing | Pleasure | Power | Wealth | Think |
Baron de Montesquieu, fully Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu
Experience constantly proves that every man who has power is impelled to abuse it; he goes on till he is pulled up by some limits. Who would say; it! virtue even has need of limits.
Abuse | Character | Experience | Man | Need | Power | Virtue | Virtue |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
Greatness of soul is not so much mounting high and pressing forward, as knowing how to put oneself in order and circumscribe oneself. It regards as great all that is enough and shows its elevation by preferring moderate things to eminent ones. There is nothing so beautiful and just as to play the man well and fitly, nor any knowledge so arduous as to know how to live this life well and naturally; and of all our maladies the most barbarous is to despise our being.
Character | Despise | Enough | Greatness | Knowing | Knowledge | Life | Life | Man | Nothing | Order | Play | Soul |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
In truth, knowledge is a great and very useful quality; those who despise it give evidence enough of their stupidity. But yet I do not set its value at that extreme measure that some attribute to it, like Herillus the philosopher, who placed in it the sovereign good, and held that it was in its power to make us wise and content. That I do not believe, nor what others have said, that knowledge is the mother of all virtue, and all vice is produced by ignorance. If that is true, it is subject to a long interpretation.
Character | Despise | Enough | Evidence | Extreme | Good | Ignorance | Knowledge | Mother | Power | Stupidity | Truth | Virtue | Virtue | Wise | Value | Vice |
Exceptional abilities develop most fully in cultures that prize them... no aspect of human nature is immune to social influence.
Character | Human nature | Influence | Nature |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
True freedom is to have power over oneself for everything.
Ashley Montagu, fully Montague Francis Ashley Montagu, born Israel Ehrenberg
Human beings are not born with human nature - they develop it.
Character | Human nature | Nature |
Molière, pen name of Jean Baptiste Poquelin NULL
The defects of human nature afford us opportunities of exercising our philosophy, the best employment of our virtues. If all men were righteous, all hearts true and frank and loyal, what use would our virtues be?
Character | Defects | Human nature | Men | Nature | Philosophy |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
The poverty of goods is easily cured; the poverty of the soul is irreparable.
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
The virtue of the soul does not consist in flying high, but walking orderly; its grandeur does not exercise itself in grandeur, but in mediocrity.
Character | Mediocrity | Soul | Virtue | Virtue |
Tom Morris, fully Thomas V. "Tom" Morris
We are here to attempt to give more to this life than we take from it, a task that, if undertaken properly, is impossible. The more we give, the more we get. But that’s the point. We are here to discover, develop and cultivate, in loving stewardship of our world, our neighbors and ourselves. Each of us is intended to grow and flourish within the power of our talents on every dimension of worldly existence: the Intellectual, the Aesthetic and the Moral - the great I Am - in such a way as to find our place in the overarching realm of the Spiritual, the ultimate context of it all. There is more to life than meets the eye. Much is required. But more is offered. We are participants in a grand enterprise, not called upon to consume with endless desire, but rather to care and create in such a way as to free the spirit of this vast creation to love and glorify its creator forever. Why? Because it is good. And that’s good enough for me.
Aesthetic | Care | Character | Desire | Enough | Existence | Good | Life | Life | Love | Power | Spirit | Stewardship | World |