This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Plutarch, named Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus after becoming Roman citizen NULL
Man is neither by birth nor disposition a savage, nor of unsocial habits, but only becomes so by indulging in vices contrary to his nature.
Hope is a disposition of the soul to persuade itself that what it desires will come to pass.
A disposition to preserve, and an ability to improve, taken together, would be my standard of a statesman.
Ability |
Truth is one forever absolute, but opinion is truth filtered through the moods, the blood, the disposition of the spectator.
The disposition of all power is to abuses, nor does it at all mend the matter that its possessors are a majority. Unrestrained political authority, though it be confided to masses, cannot be trusted without positive limitations, men in bodies being but an aggregation of the passions, weaknesses and interests of men as individuals.
Art is the human disposition of sensible or intelligible matter for an aesthetic end.
Within even the most social group there are many relations that are not as yet social. A large number of human relationships in any social group are still upon the machine-like plane. Individuals use one another so as to get desired results, without reference to the emotional and intellectual disposition and consent of those used. Such uses express physical superiority of position, skill, technical ability, and command of tools, mechanical or fiscal. So far as the relations of parent and child, teacher and pupil, employer and employee, governor and governed, remain upon this level, they form no true social group, no matter how closely their respective activities touch one another. Giving and taking of orders modifies actions and results, but does not of itself effect a sharing of purposes, a communication of interests.
Giving | Superiority | Parent | Teacher |
Openness of mind means accessibility of mind to any and every consideration that will throw light upon the situation that needs to be cleared up, and that will help determine the consequences of acting this way or that. Efficiency in accomplishing ends which have been settled upon as unalterable can coexist with a narrowly opened mind. But intellectual growth means constant expansion of horizons and consequent formation of new purposes and new responses. These are impossible without an active disposition to welcome points of view hitherto alien; an active desire to entertain considerations which modify existing purposes. Retention of capacity to grow is the reward of such intellectual hospitality. The worst thing about stubbornness of mind, about prejudices, is that they arrest development; they shut off the mind from new stimuli. Open-mindedness means retention of the childlike attitude; closed-mindedness means premature intellectual old age.
Capacity | Consequences | Consideration | Desire | Efficiency | Ends | Growth | Light | Means | Mind | Reward | Will | Old |
Happiness is an endowment and not an acquisition. It depends more upon temperament and disposition than environment.
A very small offence may be a just cause for great resentment: it is often much less the particular instance which is obnoxious to us than the proof it carries with it of the general tenor and disposition of the mind from whence it sprung.
Leonardo da Vinci, fully Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci
Good culture is born of a good disposition; and since the cause is more to be praised than the effect, I will rather praise a good disposition without culture, than good culture without the disposition.
Menander, aka Menander of Athens NULL
Whosoever lends a greedy ear to a slanderous report is either himself of a radically bad disposition or a mere child in sense.
Child |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
Virtue refuses facility for her companion ... the easy, gentle, and sloping path that guides the footsteps of a good natural disposition is not the path of true virtue. It demands a rough and thorny road.
Good |
Art is the human disposition of sensible or intelligible matter for an esthetic end.
Among the believers who show most perfect faith are those who have best disposition and are kindest to their families.
Faith |
Bawa Mahaiyadden, fully Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen
The real fast is the blossoming of the inner heart. Fragrance must emanate. The qualities, conduct, behavior, and disposition that accompany this blossoming make no sound. Light and fragrance must dawn in the inner heart. The one point which is God must resplend. Do fast, but make sure the heart blossoms; make it fragrant. The flowering scent must emanate, and when that space is perceived, the One who inhales that perfume will come. The One who perceives that fragrance will come. He is the Lord.
Self-esteem is the disposition to experience oneself as being competent to cope with the basic challenges of life, and as being worthy of happiness. Thus, it consists of two components: (1) self-efficacy — confidence in one’s ability to think, learn, choose, and make appropriate decisions; and (2) self-respect — confidence that love, friendship, achievement, success — in a word, happiness — are natural and appropriate.
Ability | Confidence | Experience | Success | Happiness |
Paul Johann Feuerbach, fully Paul Johann Anselm Ritter von Feuerbach
The object of the senses is in itself indifferent-independent of the disposition or of the judgment; but the object of religion is a selected object; the most excellent, the first, the supreme being; it essentially presupposes a critical judgment, a discrimination between the divine and the non-divine, between that which is worthy of adoration and that which is not worthy. And here may be applied, without and limitation, the proposition: the object of any subject is nothing else than the subject's own nature taken objectively. Such as are a man's thoughts and dispositions, such is his God.
Peter Abelard, Latin: Petrus Abaelardus or Abailard; French: Pierre Abélard
The relation of knowledge to power is one not only of servility but of truth. Much knowledge, if out of proportion to the disposition of forces, is invalid, however formally correct it may be.