This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Bawa Mahaiyadden, fully Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen
Children of any religion who have true faith must realize that God is the only One who knows all of everything. Therefore, only God can judge whether a person has faith, certitude, and determination or not and whether a person lives with that purity that can be called Islam or not. No one else can give that judgment. Do not wave your religion like a banner and go out to capture others. Only one kind of war is permissible in the eyes of God: the war you wage within yourself to defeat the demonic forces of lust, anger, jealousy, desire for revenge, and other evil feelings and attributes that may exist within your heart. God has sent each of the prophets as witnesses to the grace of God and as supports to help us in this inner war. This is the reason for the Qur'an. It is to help the true Muslim fight this inner battle and win victory over his own base desires that God sent the Messenger with the Qur'an.
Battle | Defeat | Desire | Determination | Evil | Faith | Feelings | God | Grace | Purity | Reason | Religion | War | God |
Bawa Mahaiyadden, fully Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen
My precious children, please bear with me when I plead with you, you who are like those whom I have given birth to, born of me, to such of you, I gift this Knowledge of Truth, which is, that your belief, that Trust in the Almighty, is your Power and your Strength, your Purity and the Perfection of your Soul. These will determine the destiny of your Soul and ensure the victory of your existence, victory of Perfection and Purity, the victory of Unity, when you attain that conviction that all other lives are like your own life.
Birth | Destiny | Knowledge | Perfection | Power | Purity | Soul | Trust | Will |
Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon I
It is only a step from victory to disaster. My experience is that, in a crisis, some detail always decides the issue.
Nachman of Breslov, aka Reb Nachman Breslover or Bratslav, Nachman from Uman NULL
Human fallibility being what it is, victory and truth do not always go together. Therefore, if you have to always win, you can't always be true.
Truth |
Art defies defeat by its very existence, representing the celebration of life, in spite of all attempts to degrade and destroy it.
Some princes are born in palaces. Some are born in mangers. But a few are born in the imagination, out of scraps of history and hope....Barack Hussein Obama did not win because of the color of his skin. Nor did he win in spite of it. He won because at a very dangerous moment in the life of a still young country, more people than have ever spoken before came together to try to save it. And that was a victory all its own.
When defeat comes, accept it as a signal that your plans are not sound, rebuild those plans, and set sail once more toward your coveted goal.
Defeat |
Nelson Mandela, fully Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela
The victory of democracy in South Africa is the common achievement of all humanity.
Achievement | Democracy |
Nelson Mandela, fully Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela
It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.
Nikolai Berdyaev, fully Nikolai Alexandrovich Berdyaev, also spelled Nichlas Berdiaev
In art there is liberation. The essential in artistic creativity is victory over the burden of necessity. In art man lives outside himself, outside his burdens, the burden of life. Every creative artistic act is a partial transfiguration of life.
Art | Creativity | Man | Art |
Nelson Mandela, fully Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela
I am fundamentally an optimist. Whether that comes from nature or nurture, I cannot say. Part of being optimistic is keeping one's head pointed toward the sun, one's feet moving forward. There were many dark moments when my faith in humanity was sorely tested, but I would not and could not give myself up to despair. That way lays defeat and death.
Oswald Spengler, fully Oswald Manuel Arnold Gottfried Spengler
The secret of all victory lies in the organization of the non-obvious.
Paul Feyerabend, fully Paul Karl Feyerabend
Progress was often achieved by a "criticism from the past"... After Aristotle and Ptolemy, the idea that the earth moves - that strange, ancient, and "entirely ridiculous", Pythagorean view was thrown on the rubbish heap of history, only to be revived by Copernicus and to be forged by him into a weapon for the defeat of its defeaters. The Hermetic writings played an important part in this revival, which is still not sufficiently understood, and they were studied with care by the great Newton himself. Such developments are not surprising. No idea is ever examined in all its ramifications and no view is ever given all the chances it deserves. Theories are abandoned and superseded by more fashionable accounts long before they have had an opportunity to show their virtues. Besides, ancient doctrines and "primitive" myths appear strange and nonsensical only because their scientific content is either not known, or is distorted by philologists or anthropologists unfamiliar with the simplest physical, medical or astronomical knowledge.
Care | Defeat | Earth | Important | Opportunity | Theories |
Pema Chödrön, born Deirdre Blomfield-Brown
Once there was a young warrior. Her teacher told her that she had to do battle with fear. She didn’t want to do that. It seemed too aggressive; it was scary; it seemed unfriendly. But the teacher said she had to do it and gave her the instructions for the battle. The day arrived. The student warrior stood on one side, and fear stood on the other. The warrior was feeling very small, and fear was looking big and wrathful. They both had their weapons. The young warrior roused herself and went toward fear, prostrated three times, and asked, ‘May I have permission to go into battle with you?’ Fear said, ‘Thank you for showing me so much respect that you ask permission.’ Then the young warrior said, ‘How can I defeat you?’ Fear replied, ‘My weapons are that I talk fast, and I get very close to your face. Then you get completely unnerved, and you do whatever I say. If you don’t do what I tell you, I have no power. You can listen to me, and you can have respect for me. You can even be convinced by me. But if you don’t do what I say, I have no power.’ In that way, the student warrior learned how to defeat fear.
Battle | Day | Defeat | Fear | Respect | Weapons | Respect | Teacher |
Bear Bryant, fully Paul William "Bear" Bryant
If you believe in yourself and have dedication and pride - and never quit - you’ll be a winner. The price of victory is high, but so are the rewards.
Dedication | Price | Pride |
Pitirim A. Sorokin, fully Pitirim Alexandrovich (Alexander) Sorokin
Only the power of unbounded love practiced in regard to all human beings can defeat the forces of interhuman strife, and can prevent the pending extermination of man by man on this planet. Without love, no armament, no war, no diplomatic machinations, no coercive police force, no school education, no economic or political measures, not even hydrogen bombs can prevent the pending catastrophe
I used to think it was great to disregard happiness, to press on to a high goal, careless, disdainful of it. But now I see that there is nothing so great as to be capable of happiness; to pluck it out of "each moment and whatever happens"; to find that one can ride as gay and buoyant on the angry, menacing, tumultuous waves of life as on those that glide and glitter under a clear sky; that it is not defeat and wretchedness which come out of the storm of adversity, but strength and calmness.
Pope John Paul II, born Karol Józef Wojtyła, aka Saint John Paul the Great NULL
War is a defeat for humanity.
Defeat |