This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Hazrat Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan
Although the tongue of God is busy speaking through all things, yet in order to speak to the deaf ears of many among us, it is necessary for Him to speak through the lips of man. He has done this all through the history of man, every great teacher of the past having been this guiding Spirit living the life of God in human guise. In other words, their human guise consists of various coats worn by the same person, who appeared to be different in each. Shiva, Buddha, Rama, Krishna, on the other side, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Mohammad on the other; and many more, known or unknown to history, always one and the same person.
God | History | Life | Life | Man | Order | Past | Spirit | Words | God | Teacher |
Thomas R. Kelly, fully Thomas Raymond Kelly
Deep within us all there is an amazing inner sanctuary of the soul, a holy place, a Divine Center, a speaking Voice… Life from the Center is a life of unhurried peace and power. It is simple. It is serene. It is amazing. It is radiant.
Niccolò Machiavelli, formally Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
There is no other way of guarding one’s self against flattery than by letting men understand that they will not offend you by speaking the truth; but when everyone can tell you the truth, you lose their respect. A prudent prince must therefore take a third course, by choosing for his council wise men, and giving these alone full liberty to speak the truth to him, but only of those things that he asks and of nothing else; but he must ask them about everything and hear their opinion, and afterwards deliberate by himself in his own way.
Flattery | Giving | Liberty | Men | Nothing | Opinion | Respect | Self | Truth | Will | Wise | Understand |
Children seem to learn to talk by inventing their own words and rules: by experimenting with language. Children make statements to adults and then wait for adults to put the statements into adult language so they can make a comparison… If the adult says nothing or simply continues the conversation, the child assumes his or her utterance is correct. When adults “correct” – that is, expand in adult language what the children have said – they are providing feedback. The adult and the child are actually speaking different languages, but they understand the situation, the child can compare their different ways of saying the same thing.
Children | Conversation | Language | Nothing | Words | Child | Learn | Understand |
Errors and exaggerations do not matter. What matters is boldness in thinking with a; strong-pitched voice, in speaking out about things as one feels them in the moment of speaking; in having the temerity to proclaim what one believes to be true without fear of the consequences. If one were to await the possession of the absolute truth, one must be either a fool or a mute. If the creative impulse were muted, the world would then be stayed on its march.
Absolute | Boldness | Consequences | Fear | Impulse | Thinking | Truth | World |
Some of the virtues are intellectual and others moral, philosophic wisdom and understanding and practical wisdom being intellectual, liberality and temperance moral. For in speaking about a man’s character we do not say that he is wise or has understanding but that he is good-tempered or temperate; yet we praise the wise man also with respect to his state of mind; and of states of mind we call those which merit praise virtues.
Character | Good | Man | Merit | Mind | Praise | Respect | Understanding | Wisdom | Wise | Respect |
Few friendships would endure if each party knew what his friend said about him in his absence, even when speaking sincerely and dispassionately.
Tacitus, fully Publius (or Gaius) Cornelius Tacitus NULL
Fear is not in the habit of speaking truth; when perfect sincerity is expected, perfect freedom must be allowed; nor has any one who is apt to be angry when he hears the truth, any cause to wonder that he does not hear it.
Cause | Fear | Freedom | Habit | Sincerity | Truth | Wonder |
It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations - past and present - are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual's hunger, anxieties, dreams, and preoccupations have remained unchanged through the millennia. Thus, we are up against the paradox that the individual who is more complex, unpredictable, and mysterious than any communal entity is the one nearest to our understanding; so near that even the interval of millennia cannot weaken our feeling of kinship. If in some manner the voice of an individual reaches us from the remotest distance of time, it is a timeless voice speaking about ourselves.
Dreams | Hunger | Individual | Paradox | Past | Present | Time | Understanding |
The source of man's creativeness is in his deficiencies; he creates to compensate himself for what he lacks. He became Homo faber - a maker of weapons and tools - to compensate for his lack of specialized organs. He became Homo ludens - a player, tinker, and artist - to compensate for his lack of inborn skills. He became a speaking animal to compensate for his lack of the telepathic faculty by which animals communicate with each other. He became a thinker to compensate for the ineffectualness of his instincts.
The theologian who has no joy in his work is not a theologian at all. Sulky faces morose thoughts and boring ways of speaking are intolerable in this science.
Lord Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Cautiously avoid speaking of the domestic affairs either of yourself, or of other people. Yours are nothing to them but tedious gossip; and theirs are nothing to you.
Lord Chesterfield, Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
The manner of your speaking is full as important as the matter.
Moral cowardice that keeps us from speaking our minds is as dangerous to this country as irresponsible talk. The right way is not always the popular and easy way. Standing for right when it is unpopular is a true test of moral character.
Cicero, fully Marcus Tullius Cicero, anglicized as Tully NULL
We should be as careful of our words as of our actions, and as far from speaking ill as from doing ill.
Words |