This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
'Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.
The reason for the sublime simplicity in the works of nature lies all too often in the sublime shortsightedness in the observer.
Nature | Reason | Simplicity | Wisdom |
Birth and death are like two ships in a harbor. There is no reason to rejoice at the ship setting out on a journey [birth], not knowing what she may encounter on the high seas, but we should rejoice at the ship returning to port [death] safely.
Happiness is the greatest paradox in nature. It can grow in any soil, live under any condition. It defies environment. The reason for this is that it does not come from without but from within. Whenever you see a person seeking happiness outside himself, you can be sure he has never found it.
Gottfried Leibniz, fully Gottfried Wilhalm von Leibniz, Baron von Leibnitz
As there is an infinite number of possible universes in the ideas of God, and as only one can exist, there must be sufficient reason for God’s choice, to determine him to one rather than to another. And this reason can only be found in the fitness, or in the degrees of perfection, which these worlds contain.
Men become attached to us not by reason of the services we render them, but by reason of the services they render us.
Curiosity in children is but an appetite for knowledge. One great reason why children abandon themselves wholly to silly pursuits and trifle away their time insipidly is, because they find their curiosity balked, and their inquiries neglected.
Appetite | Children | Curiosity | Knowledge | Reason | Time | Wisdom |
New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common.
Maurice Maeterlinck, fully Count Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck
It is from reason that justice springs, but goodness is born of wisdom.
George T. Lucas, fully George Walton Lucas, Jr.
Life cannot be explained. The only reason for life is life. There is no why. We are. Life is beyond reason. One might think of life as a large organism, and we are but a small, symbiotic part of it. It is possible that on a spiritual level we are all connected in a way that continues beyond the comings and goings of various life forms. My best guess is that we share a collective spirit or life force or consciousness that encompasses and goes beyond individual life forms.
Consciousness | Force | Individual | Life | Life | Reason | Spirit | Wisdom | Think |
The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opponents than from his fervent supporters. For his supporters will push him to disaster unless his opponents show him where the dangers are. So if he is wise he will often pray to be delivered from his friends, because they will ruin him. But though it hurts, he ought also to pray never to be left without opponents; for they keep him on the path of reason and good sense.
Good | Indispensable | Opposition | Reason | Will | Wisdom | Wise |
Michel de Montaigne, fully Lord Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
I see men ordinarily more eager to discover a reason for things than to find out whether the things are so.