This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"Religion should be the motor of life, the central heating plant of personality, the faith that gives joy to activity, hope to struggle, dignity to humility, zest to living." - William Lyon Phelps
"The art of walking is at once suggestive of the dignity of man. Progressive motion alone implies power, but in almost every other instance it seems a power gained at the expense of self-possession." - Henry Theodore Tuckerman
"It is by thought that has aroused my intellect from its slumbers, which has “given lustre to virtue, and dignity to truth,” or by those examples which have inflamed my soul with the love of goodness, and not by means of sculptured marble, that I hold communion with Shakespeare and Milton, with Johnson and Burke, with Howard and Wilberforce." - Francis Wayland
"The Bible is a book of faith, and a book of doctrine, and a book of morals, and a book of religion, of special revelation from God; but it is also a book which teaches man his own individual responsibility, his own dignity, and his equality with his fellow man." - Daniel Webster
"Life is an unanswered question, but let's still believe in the dignity and importance of the question." - Tennessee Williams, fully Thomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams
"In composing, think much more of your matter than your manner. Spirit, grace, and dignity of manner are of great importance, both to the speaker and writer; but of infinitely more importance are the weight and worth of matter." - William Wirt
"Truth is the only merit that gives dignity and worth to history." - John Dalberg-Acton, Lord Acton, fully John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton
"What is threatened today is moral liberty, conscience, respect for the soul, the very nobility of man. To defend the soul, its interests, its rights, its dignity, is the most pressing duty for whoever sees the danger." - Henri Frédéric Amiel
"Man is not just a stomach… Above all he hungers for dignity." - Jacobo Arbenz
"The dignity of man and the dignity of faith require the recognition of freedom to choose the truth, and freedom in the truth. Freedom cannot be identified with goodness or truth or perfection: it is by nature autonomous, it is freedom and not goodness." - Nikolai Berdyaev, fully Nikolai Alexandrovich Berdyaev, also spelled Nichlas Berdiaev
"The world is full of wickedness and misery precisely because it is based on freedom – yet that freedom constitutes the whole dignity of man and of his world. Doubtless at the price of its repudiation evil and suffering could be abolished, and the world forced to be “good” and “happy”; but man would have lost his likeness to God, which primarily resides in his freedom." - Nikolai Berdyaev, fully Nikolai Alexandrovich Berdyaev, also spelled Nichlas Berdiaev
"Never let a doctor determine your dignity. There is so much about medical care that can be humiliating and degrading. Patients need to be strict with physicians as to what is or is not acceptable." - Allan J Hamilton
"Communism was overthrown by life, by thought, by dignity." - Václav Havel
"The real tragedy is that we’re all human beings, and human beings have a sense of dignity. Any domination by one human over another leads to a loss of some part of his dignity. Is one’s dignity that big it can be crumbled away like that?" - Yusuf Idris, also Yusif Idris
"Whatever withdraws us from the power of our senses; whatever makes the past, the distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances us in the dignity of thinking beings." - Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
"Human dignity… is derived from a sense of independence." - Maria Montessori
"Poverty is not merely the lack of adequate financial resources. It entails a more profound kind of deprivation, a denial of full participation in the economic, social, and political life of society and an inability to influence decisions that affect one’s life. It means being powerless in a way that assaults not only one’s pocketbook but also one’s fundamental human dignity. Therefore, we should seek solutions that enable the poor to help themselves through such means as employment. Paternalistic programs which do too much for and too little with the poor are to be avoided." - National Conference of Catholic Bishops NULL
"Judaism can be viewed as the evolution of a people in the grip of two toweringly great ideas. The first is the idea of One God - imageless, primordially creative, and utterly transcendent - who, nevertheless, cares for the creation. The second is the idea of human dignity: men and women become fully human only by responding to the moral intuitions divinely etched in their hearts." - Philip Novak
"What the world desperately needs is bridges, individuals and groups, like Christ himself, put an end to all the distances which divide men and which hinder their access to truth, dignity, and full human development. This is another way of saying that the world needs community; it needs models of community to convince it that the diverse and warring elements in the human family can be reconciled." - Sisters of the Immaculate Heart NULL
"Article 1 – All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood." - United Nations NULL
"The shallow… consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise see in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws, namely, the fusion and combination of the conscious will, or partial individual law, with those universal, eternal, unconscious ones which run through all Time, pervade history, prove immortality, give moral purpose to the entire objective world, and the last dignity to human life." -
"God has established prayer in the moral world in order “to communicate to His creatures the dignity of causality.” That is to say, to give us a touch and a taste of what it is to be a Creator." - Alexander Whyte
"Think about it. God decided for the first and last time... to reveal himself... You would expect God to give you a lecture on theology at least. After all it’s his domain... Instead... He gave you all kind of command about human relations: Thou shall not kill; Thou shall not lie;... Why did He do that? It was so simple. But this was the lesson: God can take care of Himself. What He had to give man was the dignity of man." - Elie Wiesel, fully Eliezer "Elie" Wiesel
"True dignity abides with him alone who, in the silent hour of inward thought, can still suspect, and still revere himself, in lowliness of heart." - William Wordsworth
"We live by Admiration, Hope and Love; and even as these are well and wisely fixed, in dignity of being we ascend." - William Wordsworth
"A Humanist Code of Ethics: Do no harm to the earth, she is your mother. Being is more important than having. Never promote yourself at another's expense. Hold life sacred; treat it with reverence. Allow each person the dignity of his or her labor." - Arthur Dobrin
"The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions. Our inner balance and even our very existence depend on it. Only morality in our actions can give beauty and dignity to life." - Albert Einstein
"One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized, and cruelly mocked, but cannot be taken away unless it is surrendered." - Michael J. Fox
"Liberalism was never a straight line to progress. Yet, every step of the way it is liberalism that is open to the human possibility, believing as it does in this invariable moral sense, turning the "ought" into the "is" for all of humanity. Human freedom and dignity can be more than a dream for the few." - Marcus G. Raskin
"I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or hand; that the world owes no man a living but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living." - John D. Rockefeller, fully John Davidson Rockefeller I
"Let's face it. Let's talk sense to the American people. Let's tell them the truth, that there are no gains without pains, that we are now on the eve of great decisions, not easy decisions, like resistance when you're attacked, but along, patient, costly struggle which alone can assure triumph over the great enemies of man - war, poverty and tyranny - and the assaults upon human dignity which are the most grievous consequences of each." - Adlai Ewing Stevenson
"Let's face it. Let's talk sense to the American people. Let's tell them the truth, that there are no gains without pains, that we are now on the eve of great decisions, not easy decisions, like resistance when you're attacked, but along, patient, costly struggle which alone can assure triumph over the great enemies of man - war, poverty and tyranny - and the assaults upon human dignity which are the most grievous consequences of each." -
"Let's face it. Let's talk sense to the American people. Let's tell them the truth, that there are no gains without pains, that we are now on the eve of great decisions, not easy decisions, like resistance when you're attacked, but along, patient, costly struggle which alone can assure triumph over the great enemies of man - war, poverty and tyranny - and the assaults upon human dignity which are the most grievous consequences of each." -
"All acts of charity or giving are valuable only inasmuch as they recognize the true dignity of those toward whom the contribution is directed. Any money or time given to another without recognizing their full equality, is as chaff in the wind, and serves only the mockery of the ego. Pity or sorrow is never a worthy reason for charity, for it only reinforces the bondage of the giver and the recipient. Real charity is never a giving, but always a sharing. He who gives as a giver remains half; he who shares, knows wholeness." - Alan Cohen
"All acts of charity or giving are valuable only inasmuch as they recognize the true dignity of those toward whom the contribution is directed. Any money or time given to another without recognizing their full equality, is as chaff in the wind, and serves only the mockery of the ego. Pity or sorrow is never a worthy reason for charity, for it only reinforces the bondage of the giver and the recipient. Real charity is never a giving, but always a sharing. He who gives as a giver remains half; he who shares, knows wholeness." -
"All acts of charity or giving are valuable only inasmuch as they recognize the true dignity of those toward whom the contribution is directed. Any money or time given to another without recognizing their full equality, is as chaff in the wind, and serves only the mockery of the ego. Pity or sorrow is never a worthy reason for charity, for it only reinforces the bondage of the giver and the recipient. Real charity is never a giving, but always a sharing. He who gives as a giver remains half; he who shares, knows wholeness." -
"There is dignity in work only when it is work freely accepted." - Albert Camus
"Ideas, when vented in a book, carry with them a kind of dignity and certainty which awe many into implicit belief." - Amos Bronson Alcott
"The dignity of the individual requires that he not be reduced to vassalage by the largesse of others." - Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Everything on earth [is] beautiful, everything, except what we ourselves think and do when we forget the higher purposes of life and our own human dignity." - Anton Chekhov, fully Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
"Dignity consists not in possessing honors, but in deserving them." - Aristotle NULL
"Dignity does not consist of possessing honors, but in deserving them." - Aristotle NULL
"Human dignity… can be achieved only in the field of ethics, and ethical achievement is measured by the degree in which our actions are governed by compassion and love, not by greed and aggressiveness." - Arnold J. Toynbee, fully Arnold Joseph Toynbee
"Human dignity...can be achieved only in the field of ethics, and ethical achievement is measured by the degree in which our actions are governed by compassion and love, not by greed and aggressiveness." - Arnold J. Toynbee, fully Arnold Joseph Toynbee
"The dignity of truth is lost with much protesting." - Ben Jonson
"A thinking reed. It is not from space that I must seek my dignity, but from government of my thought. I shall have no more if I possess worlds. By space the universe encompasses and swallows me up like an atom; by thought I comprehend the world." - Blaise Pascal
"All our dignity consists... in thought. By it we must elevate ourselves, and not by space and time which we cannot fill. Let us endeavor, then, to think well; this is the principle of morality." - Blaise Pascal