This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Henry Christopher "H.C." Bailey
Indecision and hesitation are the weakness of a careful nature always intent on the saving of face and losing it thereby.
Character | Indecision | Nature | Weakness |
Charles Alexander Eastman, first named Ohiyesa
It was our belief that the love of possessions is a weakness to be overcome. Its appeal is to the material part, and if allowed its way, it will in time disturb one’s spiritual balance. Therefore, children must early learn the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving. If a child is inclined to be grasping, or to cling to any of his or her little possessions, legends are related about the contempt and disgrace falling upon the ungenerous and mean person... The Indians in their simplicity literally give away all that they have - to relatives, to guests of other tribes or clans, but above all to the poor and the aged, from whom they can hope for no return.
Balance | Beauty | Belief | Character | Children | Contempt | Disgrace | Generosity | Giving | Guests | Hope | Legends | Little | Love | Possessions | Simplicity | Taste | Time | Weakness | Will | Beauty | Child | Happiness | Learn |
Zane Grey Orig. name Pearl Grey
To bear up under loss; to fight the bitterness of defeat and the weakness of grief; to be victor over anger, to smile when tears are close; to resist disease and evil men and base instincts; to hate hate and to love love; to go on when it would seem good to die; to look up with unquenchable faith in something ever more about to be - that is what any man can do, and be great.
Anger | Bitterness | Character | Defeat | Disease | Evil | Faith | Good | Grief | Hate | Love | Man | Men | Smile | Tears | Weakness |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
Knowledge is an excellent drug; but no drug has virtue enough to preserve itself from corruption and decay, if the vessel be tainted and impure wherein it is put to keep.
Character | Corruption | Enough | Knowledge | Virtue | Virtue |
Pliny the Elder, full name Casus Plinius Secundus NULL
Lust is an enemy to the purse, a foe to the person, a canker to the mind, a corrosive to the conscience, a weakness of the wit, a besotter of the senses, and finally a mortal bane to all the body.
Body | Character | Conscience | Enemy | Lust | Mind | Mortal | Weakness | Wit |
Stagnation is something worse than death; it is corruption also.
Character | Corruption | Death |
Better that we should err in action than wholly refuse to perform. The storm is so much better than the calm, as it declares the presence of a living principle. Stagnation is something worse than death. It is corruption also.
Action | Better | Character | Corruption | Death |
Madame Swetchine, fully Anne Sophie Swetchine née Sophia Petrovna Soïmonov or Soymanof
We deceive ourselves when we fancy that only weakness needs support. Strength needs it far more. A straw or a feather sustains itself long in the air.
War is the corruption and disgrace of man.
Character | Corruption | Disgrace | Man | War |
Saint Augustine, aka Augustine of Hippo, St. Austin, Bishop of Hippo NULL
Wine-drinking is the mother of all mischief, the root of crimes, the spring of vices, the whirlwind of the brain, the overthrow of the sense, the tempest of the tongue, the ruin of the body, the shame of life, the stain of honesty, and the plague and corruption of the soul.
Body | Corruption | Honesty | Life | Life | Mother | Sense | Shame | Soul | Wisdom |
Lord Acton, John Emerich Dalberg-Acton
Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; but still more when they are super bad and add the tendency of the certainty of corruption of authority.
Authority | Corruption | Influence | Men | Wisdom |
Beaumont and Fletcher, Francis Beaumont (c.1585-1614) and John Fletcher
Nothing is a misery, unless our weakness apprehend it so; we cannot be more faithful to ourselves, in anything that’s manly, than to make ill-fortune as contemptible to us as it makes us to others.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton
Wherever progress ends, decline in variably begins; but remember that the healthful progress of society is like the natural life of man - it consists in the gradual and harmonious development of all its constitutional powers, all its component parts, and you introduce weakness and disease into the whole system whether you attempt to stint or to force its growth.
Disease | Ends | Force | Growth | Life | Life | Man | Progress | Society | System | Weakness | Wisdom | Society |