This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
So I am against all big organizations as such, national ones first and foremost; against all big successes and big results; and in favor of the eternal forces of truth which always work in the individual and immediately unsuccessful way, under-dogs always, till history comes, after they are long dead, and puts them on top.
Discipline | Force | War |
William Melmoth, wrote under pseudonym Sir Thomas Fitzosborne
Epicurus, we are told, left behind him three hundred volumes of his own works, wherein he had not inserted a single quotation; and we have it upon the authority of Varro’s own words that he himself composed four hundred and ninety books. Seneca assures us that Didymus the grammarian wrote no less than four thousand; but Origen, it seems, was yet more prolific, and extended his performances even to six thousand treatises. It is obvious to imagine with what sort of materials the productions of such expeditious workmen were wrought up: sound thoughts and well-matured reflections could have no share, we may be sure, in these hasty performances. Thus are books multiplied, whilst authors are scarce; and so much easier is it to write than to think! But shall I not myself, Palamedes, prove an instance that it is so, if I suspend any longer your own more important reflections by interrupting you with such as mine?
Absurd | Birth | Circumstances | Gloom | Hypothesis | Light | Observation | Opinion | Principles | World |
William Melmoth, wrote under pseudonym Sir Thomas Fitzosborne
Upon this principle I imagine it is that some of the finest pieces of antiquity are written in the dialogue manner. Plato and Tully, it should seem, thought truth could never be examined with more advantage than amidst the amicable opposition of well-regulated converse.
Absurd | Circumstances | Contrast | Conversation | Friend | Language | Learning | Lord | Method | Reason | Spirit | Strength | Wonder | World |
Take the happiest man, the one most envied by the world, and in nine cases out of ten his inmost consciousness is one of failure. Either his ideals in the line of his achievements are pitched far higher than the achievements themselves, or else he has secret ideals of which the world knows nothing, and in regard to which he inwardly knows himself to be found wanting.
Authority | Civilization | Cruelty | Discipline | Doubt | Duty | Force | Little | Manliness | Men | Opinion | Public | Question | War | Work | Cruelty | Afraid |
There is no disguise which can hide love for long where it exists, or simulate it where it does not.
Better | Good | Observation |
The most untutored person with passion is more persuasive than the most eloquent without.
It is necessary to form a distinct notion of what is meant by the word volition in order to understand the import of the word will; for this last word expresses the power of mind of which volition is the act.
Appearance | Conversation | Genius | Impression | Man | Memory | Observation | Opinion |
Duke Ellington, fully Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington
A goal is a dream with a finish line.
O balmy breath, that dost almost persuade justice to break her sword. One more, one more! Be thus when thou art dead, and I will kill thee, and love thee after. One more, and that's the last! So sweet was ne'er so fatal. I must weep, but they are cruel tears. This sorrow's heavenly; it strikes where it doth love. She wakes.
POLONIUS:Do you know me, my lord? HAMLET: Excellent well; you're a fishmonger. POLONIUS: Not I, my lord. Hamlet Then I would you were so honest a man. POLONIUS: Honest, my lord! HAMLET: Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand. POLONIUS: That's very true, my lord. HAMLET: [Reads] For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a god kissing carrion, — Have you a daughter? POLONIUS:I have, my lord. HAMLET: Let her not walk i' the sun: conception is a blessing: but not as your daughter may conceive; — friend, look to 't. POLONIUS:[Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my daughter: — yet he knew me not at first; he said I was a fishmonger: he is far gone, far gone: and truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for love; very near this.
Ishvarakrishna, aka Iśvarakṛṣṇa NULL
Munificent Nature, endowed with attributes, accomplishes by manifold means the purpose of the attributeless and uncaring Self, with no gain for itself.
Remember, sir, my liege, the kings your ancestors, together with the natural bravery of your isle, which stands as Neptune's park, ribbed and paled in with rocks unscalable and roaring waters, with sands that will not bear your enemies' boats but suck them up to th' topmast.
Memory | Observation | Past | Youth | Youth |
Given that life is so short, do I really want to spend one-ninetieth of my remaining days on earth reading Edward Gibbon?
Cause | Happy | Observation | Quiet | Statistics | Work | World |
Let it be sufficient to say that, on this night, he was still my lighthouse and albatross in equal measure. The only thing more unthinkable than leaving was staying; the only thing more impossible than staying was leaving. I didn’t want to destroy anything or anybody. I just wanted to slip quietly out the back door, without causing any fuss or consequences, and then not stop running until I reached Greenland.
Discipline | Peace | Speech | Words | World |