This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Show me what a man envies the least in others and I will show you what he has got the most of himself.
Being morally good, for the majority of Americans, means following the norms and values of their society or culture - whether this be their peer culture, their church, their country, or a combination of these. The theory that morality is relative to societal norms is known in moral philosophy as cultural relativism. Many others claim that morality is relative to the individual and is different for every person depending on what they feel. This theory is known in philosophy as ethical subjectivism.
Church | Culture | Good | Individual | Majority | Means | Morality | Philosophy | Society | Society | Following |
The mirror usually reflects only the way others see us, the way we are expected to behave, forced to behave - hardly ever what we really are.
The truly innocent are those who not only are guiltless themselves, but who think others are.
Think |
To know others is hard, but to know yourself is still harder.
The painter will produce pictures of little merit if he takes the works of others as his standard.
True politeness is perfect ease and freedom. It simply consists in treating others just as you love to be treated yourself.
Freedom | Love | Politeness |
If we overcome laziness, all the other impediments to spiritual growth will be overcome. If we do not, none of the others will be hurdled.
In order to judge of the inside of others, study your own; for men in general are very much alike, and though one has one prevailing passion, and another has another, yet their operations are much the same; and whatever engages or disgusts, pleases, or offends you in others, will, mutatis mutandis, engage, disgust, please, or offend others in you.
Whoever would be a teacher of men let him begin by teaching himself before teaching others; and let him teach by example before teaching by word. For he who teaches himself and rectifies his own ways is more deserving of respect and reverence than he who would teach others and rectify their ways.
Example | Men | Respect | Reverence | Teach | Respect | Teacher |
There are three classes of people in the world. The first learn from their own experience - these are wise; the second learn from the experiences of others - these are the happy; the third neither learn from their own experience nor the experience of others - these are fools.
Almost all men are born with every passion to some extent, but there is hardly a man who has not a dominant passion to which the others are subordinate. Discover this governing passion in every individual; and when you have found the master passion of a man, remember never to trust to him where that passion is concerned.
Individual | Man | Men | Passion | Trust |
The more virtuous any man is, the less easily does he suspect others to be vicious.
Man |
It is the peculiar quality of a fool to perceive the faults of others and to forget his own.
We judge others by their words and deeds, ourselves by our thoughts and our intentions.
There are some duties we owe even to those who have wronged us. There is, after all, a limit to retribution and punishment. Or rather, may I say that it is enough to get a wrong-doer to repent of his misdeed, so that he may not repeat the offense, and also a means of deterring others from doing wrong.
Enough | Means | Offense | Punishment | Wrong |
Man's most human characteristic is not his ability to learn, which he shares with many other species, but his ability to teach and store what others have developed and taught him.
How can we venture to judge others when we know so well how ill-equipped they are for judging us?
You can easily judge the character of others by how they treat those who can do nothing for them or to them.