This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The world is a looking-glass, and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. Frown at it, and it in turn will look sourly at you; laugh at it, and with it, and it is a jolly, kind companion.
Man | Reflection | Will | World |
There is nothing in which people more betray their character than in what they laugh at.
Powhatan, proper name was Wahunsenacawh, also spelled Wahunsonacock NULL
Why will you take by force what you may obtain by love? Why will you destroy us who supply you with food? What can you get by war?... We are unarmed, and willing to give you what you ask, if you come in friendly manner... I am not so simple as not to know it is better to eat good meat, sleep comfortably, live quietly with my women and children, laugh and be merry with the English, and being their friend, trade for their copper and hatchets, than to run away from them... Take away your guns and swords, the cause of all our jealousy, or you may die in the same manner.
Better | Cause | Destroy | Force | Good | Love | War | Will |
If you were all alone in the universe with no one to talk to, no one with which to share the beauty of the stars, to laugh with, to touch, what would be your purpose in life? It is other life, it is love, which gives your life meaning. This is harmony. We must discover the joy of each other, the joy of challenge, the joy of growth.
Beauty | Challenge | Growth | Harmony | Joy | Life | Life | Love | Meaning | Purpose | Purpose | Universe | Beauty |
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool. To weep is to risk appearing sentimental. To reach out for another is to risk involvement. To expose our feelings is to risk exposing our true self. To place your ideas and dreams before the crowd is to risk loss. To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk despair. To try at all is to risk failure. But risk we must, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing. The man, the woman who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing.
Despair | Dreams | Failure | Feelings | Hazard | Hope | Ideas | Life | Life | Love | Man | Nothing | Risk | Self | Woman |
If we turn from contemplating the world as a whole, and, in particular, the generations of men as they live their little hour of mock-existence, and then are swept away in rapid succession; if we turn from this, and look at life in its small details, as presented, say, in a comedy, how ridiculous it all seems ! It is like a drop of water seen through a microscope, a single drop teeming with infusoria; or a speck of cheese full of mites invisible to the naked eye. How e laugh as they bustle about so eagerly, and struggle with one another in so tiny a space! And whether here, or in the little span of human life, this terrible activity produces a comic effect.
Comedy | Existence | Life | Life | Little | Men | Space | Struggle | World |
Today. Mend a quarrel. Search out a friend. Dismiss suspicion and replace it with trust. Write a love letter. Share some treasure. Give a soft answer. Encourage youth. Manifest your loyalty in a word or deed. Keep a promise. Find the time. Forego a grudge. Forgive an enemy. Listen. Apologize if you were wrong. Try to understand. Flout envy. Examine demands on others. Think first of someone else. Appreciate, be kind, be gentle. Laugh a little more. Deserve confidence. Take up arms against malice. Decry complacency. Express your gratitude. Worship your God. Gladden the heart of a child. Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth. Speak your love. Speak it again. Still speak it again. Speak it still once again.
Beauty | Complacency | Confidence | Earth | Enemy | Envy | Friend | God | Gratitude | Heart | Little | Love | Loyalty | Loyalty | Malice | Pleasure | Promise | Search | Suspicion | Time | Trust | Wonder | Worship | Wrong | Youth | Beauty | Forgive | Think |
Dale Carnegie, originally spelled Dale Carnegey
Don't laugh at a child's ambitions. There is no sting so sharp as ridicule, and a laugh is often ridicule to a child. What a parent should do when he knows his child is overreaching, is to talk it over with him from every angle, and, if possible, find an angle from which the job can be attacked with hope of success. Then urge him forward, give him every encouragement. Above all, don't help your child to do something that he can accomplish on his own. Don't deny him the priceless privilege and thrill of developing his own success.
Dale Carnegie, originally spelled Dale Carnegey
Make a man laugh a good hearty laugh, and you have paved the way for friendship. When a man laughs with you, he is some extent, likes you.
Dr. Seuss, pen name for Theodore Seuss Geisel
I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, It's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, And that enables you to laugh at life's realities.
To laugh with others is one of life's great pleasures. To be laughed at by others is one of life's great hurts.
The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the old man who will not laugh is a fool.
He who has the courage to laugh is almost as much master of the world as he who is ready to die.
John Foster, fully John Watson Foster
The pride of dying rich raises the loudest laugh in hell.