This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Both sin and sickness are error, and Truth is their remedy.
A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.
Good | Government | Improvement | Industry | Labor | Men | Wise |
Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze
Throw away holiness and wisdom and people will be a hundred times happier. Throw away morality and justice, and people will do the right thing. Throw away industry and profit, and there won’t be any thieves.
Industry | Justice | Morality | People | Right | Will | Wisdom |
If those about him will talk to him often about the Stories he has read and hear him tell them, it will, besides other Advantages, add Encouragement and Delight to his Reading, when he finds there is some Use and Pleasure in it.
Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
No sickness worse than imagining thyself to be perfect can afflict thy soul.
Soul |
He who would take good care of his health should be sparing in his tastes, banish his worries, temper his desires, restrain his emotions, take good care of his vital force, spare his words, regard lightly success and failure, ignore sorrows and difficulties, drive away foolish ambitions, avoid great likes and dislikes, calm his vision and his hearing, and be faithful in his internal regimen. How can one have sickness if he does not tire his spirits and worry his soul? Therefore he would nourish his nature should eat only when he is hungry and not fill himself with food, and he should drink only when he is thirsty and not fill himself with too much drink. He should eat little and between long intervals, and not too much and not too constantly. He should aim at being a little hungry when well-filled, and being a little well-filled when hungry. Being well-filled hurts the lungs and being hungry hurts the flow of vital energy.
Care | Emotions | Energy | Failure | Force | Good | Health | Little | Nature | Regard | Soul | Success | Temper | Vision | Words | Worry |
The underlying sickness of human life is an unwillingness to look with open eyes at the condition of the world.
When enjoying life becomes the goal, it ceases producing happiness because the minute you get it you become dissatisfied. The booming entertainment industry is a symptom of a society dedicated toward tranquilizing its members with a lifetime of enjoyments.
Entertainment | Industry | Life | Life | Society | Society | Happiness |
In sickness the soul begins to dress herself for immortality.
Immortality | Soul |
Leo Tolstoy, aka Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy or Tolstoi
The aim and end of war is murder; the weapons employed in war are espionage, treachery and the encouragement of treachery, the ruining of a country, the plundering and robbing of its inhabitants for the maintenance of the army, and trickery and lying which all appear under the heading of the art of war. The military world is characterized by the absence of freedom – in other words, a rigorous discipline – enforced inactivity, ignorance, cruelty, debauchery, and drunkenness.
Absence | Art | Cruelty | Discipline | Freedom | Ignorance | Inactivity | Lying | Murder | Treachery | War | Weapons | Words | World | Art |
How could sufferings be relieved through purification? To know the Path is to get lost at the ford. Indeed, sickness comes from worldly love and poverty begins with the pursuit of greed.
The finest gift you can give anyone is encouragement. Yet, almost no one gets the encouragement they need to grow to their full potential. If everyone received the encouragement they need to grow, the genius in most everyone would blossom and the world would produce abundance beyond the wildest dreams.
As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed; neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was not part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of his intention. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it.
Individual | Industry | Intention | Public | Security | Society | Society |
By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he [the owner of capital] intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectively than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.
Good | Industry | Intention | Public | Security | Society | Society |