This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Fyodor Dostoevsky, fully Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoevsky or Feodor Mikhailovich Dostoevski
Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.
There exists a passion for comprehension, just as there exists a passion for music. That passion is rather common in children but gets lost in most people later on. Without this passion, there would be neither mathematics nor natural science.
Children | Mathematics | Music | Passion | People | Wisdom |
The only rational way of educating is to be an example - if one can't help it, a warning example.
The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity.
Awe | Curiosity | Day | Enough | Eternity | Important | Life | Life | Little | Mystery | Reality | Reason | Wisdom |
It is certainly strange to observe... how many people seem to feel vain of their own unqualified optimism when the place where optimism most flourishes is the lunatic asylum.
Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.
Equanimity | People | Wisdom |
Joseph Farrell, fully Joseph Patrick Farrell
Most people like praise. Many people have an unreasonable fear of administering it; it is part of the puritanical dislike for anything that is agreeable - to others. When it is really deserved, most people expand under it into richer and better selves.
François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon
The more you say, the less people remember. The fewer the words, the greater the profit.