This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Every person in the world may not become a personage. But every person may become a personality. The happiest people are those who think the most interesting thoughts. Interesting thoughts can live only in cultivated minds. Those who decide to use leisure as a means of mental development, who love good music, good books, good pictures, good plays at the theater, good company, good conversation - what are they? They are the happiest people in the world; and they are not only happy in themselves, they are the cause of happiness in others.
Books | Cause | Conversation | Good | Happy | Leisure | Love | Means | Music | People | Personality | Wisdom | World | Happiness | Think |
Babe Paley, fully Barbara Cushing "Babe" Mortimer Paley
The common course of things is in favor of happiness. Happiness is the rule, misery the exception. Were the order reversed, our attention would be called to examples of health and competency, instead of disease and want.
Attention | Disease | Health | Order | Rule | Wisdom | Happiness |
Jean Racine, baptismal name Jean-Baptiste Racine
The happiness of the wicked passes away like a torrent.
The influences that really make and mar human happiness are beyond the reach of the law.
We do not know either unalloyed happiness or unmitigated misfortune. Everything in this world is a tangled yarn; we taste nothing in its purity; we do not remain two moments in the same state. Our affections as well as bodies, are in a perpetual flux.
Misfortune | Nothing | Purity | Taste | Wisdom | World | Happiness |
Shantananda Saraswathi, fully Swami Shantananda Saraswathi, born Chandrashekar
Since every soul is looking for happiness and since happiness is really nowhere except in Divine Essence, every soul has to realize ultimately that it has been distracted. Then every soul has to retrace its steps so it can reach that Source of happiness which is both divine and universal.
Happiness is not in our circumstances but in ourselves. It is not something we see, like a rainbow, or feel, like the heat of a fire. Happiness is something we are.
Circumstances | Wisdom | Happiness |
Sam Shoemaker, fully Samuel "Sam" Moor Shoemaker, III
Happiness is the sense that one matters. Happiness is an abiding enthusiasm. Happiness is single-mindedness. Happiness is whole-heartedness. Happiness is a by-product. Happiness is faith.
Enthusiasm | Faith | Sense | Wisdom | Happiness |
Lydia Sigourney, fully Lydia Huntley Sigourney, née Lydia Howard Huntley
One of the principal ingredients in the happiness of childhood is freedom from suspicion - why may it not be combined with a more extensive intercourse with mankind? A disposition to dwell on the bright side of character is like gold to its possessor; but to imagine more evil than meets the eye, betrays affinity for it.
Character | Childhood | Evil | Freedom | Gold | Mankind | Suspicion | Wisdom | Happiness |