This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Self-denial is often the sacrifice of one sort of self-love for another.
Love | Sacrifice | Self | Self-denial | Self-love |
There is but one pursuit in life which it is in the power of all to follow, and of all to attain. It is subject to no disappointments, since he that perseveres makes every difficulty an advancement, and every conquest a victory; and this is the pursuit of virtue. Sincerely to aspire after virtue is to gain her; and zealously to labor after her ways is to receive them.
Conquest | Difficulty | Labor | Life | Life | Power | Receive | Virtue | Virtue |
Faith is the flame that lifts the sacrifice to heaven.
John Kenneth Galbraith, aka "Ken"
There is certainly no absolute standard of beauty. That precisely is what make its pursuit so interesting
Religion, in its purity, is not so much a pursuit as a temper; or rather it is a temper, leading to the pursuit of all that is high and holy. Its foundation is faith; its action, works; its temper, holiness; its aim, obedience to God in improvement of self, and benevolence to men.
Action | Benevolence | Faith | God | Improvement | Men | Obedience | Purity | Religion | Self | Temper | God |
Superstition, in all times and among all nations, is the fear of a spirit whose passions are those of a man, whose acts are the acts of a man; who is present in some places, not in others; who makes some places holy and not others; who is kind to one person, unkind to another; who is pleased or angry according to the degree of attention you pay him, or praise you refuse him; who is hostile generally to human pleasure, but may be bribed by sacrifice of a part of that pleasure into permitting the rest. This, whatever form of faith it colors, is the essence of superstition.
Attention | Faith | Fear | Man | Nations | Pleasure | Praise | Present | Rest | Sacrifice | Spirit | Superstition |
John W. Gardner, fully John William Gardner
The ultimate goal of the educational system is to shift to the individual the burden of pursing his own education. This will not be a widely shared pursuit until we get over our odd conviction that education is what goes on in school buildings and nowhere else.
Education | Individual | System | Will |
John W. Gardner, fully John William Gardner
[Leaders] can express the values that hold the society together. Most important, they can conceive and articulate goals that lift people out of their petty preoccupations, carry them above the conflicts that tear a society apart, and unite them in the pursuit of objectives worthy of their best efforts.
Goals | Important | Objectives | People | Society | Society |
It is far more difficult to be simple than to be complicated; far more difficult to sacrifice skill and cease exertion in the proper place, than to expend both indiscriminately.
The best loving partnerships demand of us not great sacrifice but great expansion.
Many a time I have made a comparison between nobility of sacrifice and happiness of rebellion to find out which one is nobler and more beautiful; but until now I have distilled only one truth out of the whole matter, and this truth is sincerity, which makes all our deeds beautiful and honorable.
Deeds | Nobility | Rebellion | Sacrifice | Sincerity | Time | Truth | Deeds | Happiness |
Plutarch, named Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus after becoming Roman citizen NULL
A mere law to give all men equal rights is but useless, if the poor man must sacrifice those rights to their debts, and, in the very seats and sanctuaries of equality, the courts of justice, the offices of state, and the public discussions, be more than anywhere at the beck and bidding of the rich.
Equality | Justice | Law | Man | Men | Public | Rights | Sacrifice |
The enduring value of the relationship to the land might best be measured by the extent to which it evolves beyond self-interest. All healthy relationships entail sacrifice and are never solely about what makes one person feel good, but are about what's also good for someone else. Relationship implies a responsibility that goes beyond one's own dreams.
Dreams | Good | Land | Relationship | Responsibility | Sacrifice | Self | Self-interest | Value |
The enduring value of the relationship to the land might be best measured by the extent to which it evolves beyond self-interest. All healthy relationships entail sacrifice and are never solely about what makes one person feel good, but are about what’s also good for someone else. Relationship implies a responsibility that goes beyond one’s own dreams.
Dreams | Good | Land | Relationship | Responsibility | Sacrifice | Self | Self-interest | Value |
The origin of all wars is the pursuit of wealth, and we are forced to pursue wealth because we live in slavery to the cares of the body.
The effects of opposition are wonderful. There are men who rise refreshed on hearing of a threat; men to whom a crisis which intimidates and paralyzes the majority - demanding, not the faculties of prudence and thrift, but comprehension, immovableness, the readiness to sacrifice - comes graceful and beloved as a bride.
Bride | Majority | Men | Opposition | Prudence | Prudence | Sacrifice | Thrift | Crisis |