This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
God is better served in resisting a temptation to evil than in many formal prayers.
Better | Character | Evil | God | Temptation | Wisdom | Temptation |
For most or even all forms of evil serve the Universe - much as the poisonous snake has it use - though in most cases their function is unknown. Vice itself has many useful sides: it brings about much that is beautiful, in artistic creations for example, and it stirs us to thoughtful living, not allowing us to drowse in security.
Ask many of us who are disabled what we would like in life and you would be surprised how few would say, 'Not to be disabled.' We accept our limitations.
Quintilian, fully Marcus Fabius Quintilianus, also Quintillian and Quinctilian NULL
Vice, the opposite of virtue, shows us more clearly what virtue is. Justice becomes more obvious when we have injustice to compare it to. Many such things are proved by their contraries.
Character | Injustice | Injustice | Justice | Virtue | Virtue |
Moshe Rosenstein, fully Moshe ben Chaim Rosenstein
A person who appreciates that the Almighty created everything in the world for his benefit is aware of the multitude of good things he has in the world. With this appreciation, no one considers himself poor in comparison to anyone else just because the other person has a little more than him. Even the poorest person in the world has many things for which to be thankful. Everyone has the ability to be in a state of happiness. Do not allow another person’s having more than you rob you of your happiness.
Ability | Appreciation | Character | Good | Little | World |
When a law is proposed in the people’s assembly, what is asked of them is not precisely whether they approve of the proposition or reject it, but whether it is in conforming with the general will which is theirs; each by giving his vote gives his opinion on this question, and the counting of votes yields a declaration of the general will. When, therefore, the opinion contrary to my own prevails, this proves only that I have made a mistake, and that what I believed to be the general will was not so. If my particular opinion had prevailed against the general will, I should have done something other than what I had willed, and then I should not have been free. This presupposes, it is true, that all characteristics of the general will are still to be found in the majority; when these cease to be there, no matter what position men adopt, there is no longer any freedom.
Character | Freedom | Giving | Law | Majority | Men | Mistake | Opinion | People | Position | Question | Will |
The rule of law is essentially a negative value. The law inevitably creates a great danger of arbitrary power - the rule of law is designed to minimize the danger created by the law itself. Similarly, the law may be unstable, obscure, retrospective, etc., and thus infringe people’s freedom and dignity. The rule of law is designed to prevent his danger as well. Thus the rule of law is a negative virtue in two senses: conformity to it does not cause good except through avoiding evil and the evil which is avoided is evil which could only have been caused by the law itself.
Cause | Character | Conformity | Danger | Dignity | Evil | Freedom | Good | Law | People | Power | Rule | Virtue | Virtue | Danger |
Phyllis V. Schlemmer and Dalden Jenkins
Our bodies and egos are vehicles by which we can access the experience of physical living. As a key ingredient in an automobile is its driver, so the key ingredient in a person is soul. Without active alignment to soul - a person is lost - the fundamental meaning of life is missing. Planet Earth is a sort of “soul-field”, a body of experience with a characteristic flavor, which individual souls enter to learn, evolve and serve. Perhaps it is a Hall of Mirrors at a fairground, where we see ourselves reflected, expanded and compressed in so many different ways.
Body | Character | Earth | Experience | Individual | Life | Life | Meaning | Soul |
Shantananda Saraswathi, fully Swami Shantananda Saraswathi, born Chandrashekar
Our philosophy determines the quality of our life.... how many times you go through those ups and downs you maintain your Divine changelessness.
Character | Life | Life | Philosophy |