This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Tom Robbins, fully Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins
Ideas are malleable and unstable; they not only can be misused, they invite misuse---and the better the idea the more volatile it is. That's because only the better ideas turn into dogma, and it is by this process whereby a fresh, stimulating, humanly helpful idea is changed into robot dogma that is deadly. The problem starts at the secondary level, not with the originator or developer of the idea, but with the people who are attracted to it, until the last nail breaks, and who invariably lack the overview, flexibility, imagination, and, most importantly, sense of humor to maintain it in the spirit in which it was hatched. Ideas are made by masters, dogmas by disciples, and the Buddha is always killed on the road.
Consequences | Evolution | Martyrs | Responsibility | Society | Society |
Tom Robbins, fully Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins
I'm looking for the novelists whose writing is an extension of their intellect rather than an extension of their neurosis.
Consequences | Evolution | Martyrs | Responsibility | Society | Society |
Tom Robbins, fully Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins
Conversation between a princess and an outlaw: If I stand for fairy-tale balls and dragon bait--dragon bait--what do you stand for? Me? I stand for uncertainty, insecurity, bad taste, fun, and things that go boom in the night. Franky, it seems to me that you've turned yourself into a stereotype. You may be right. I don't care. As any car freak will tell you, the old models are the most beautiful, even if they aren't the most efficient. People who sacrifice beauty for efficiency get what they deserve. Well, you may get off on being a beautiful stereotype, regardless of the social consequences, but my conscience won't allow it. And I goddamn refuse to be dragon bait. I'm as capable of rescuing you as you are of rescuing me. I'm an outlaw, not a hero. I never intended to rescue you. We're our own dragons as well as our own heroes, and we have to rescue ourselves from ourselves.
Repose |
Ay, every inch a king: when I do stare, see how the subject quakes. I pardon that man's life. — What was thy cause? — Adultery? — Thou shalt not die: die for adultery! No: the wren goes to't, and the small gilded fly does lecher in my sight. Let copulation thrive; for Gloster's bastard son was kinder to his father than my daughters got 'tween the lawful sheets. To't, luxury, pell-mell! for I lack soldiers. — Behold yond simpering dame, whose face between her forks presages snow; that minces virtue, and does shake the head to hear of pleasure's name; — the fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't with a more riotous appetite down from the waist they are centaurs, though women all above. But to the girdle do the gods inherit, beneath is all the fiend's; there's hell, there's darkness, there is the sulphurous pit; burning, scalding, stench, consumption! — fie, fie, fie! pah, pah! Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, to sweeten my imagination: there's money for thee. King Lear, Act iv, Scene 6
Fear | Life | Life | Nature | Paradise | Spirit | Thought | Thought |
God himself has no right to be a tyrant.
Accident | Argument | Boldness | Censure | Deliberation | Earth | Excellence | Force | Man | Morality | Ostentation | Principles | Property | Purpose | Purpose | Rest | Right | Sense | Will | Excellence | Deliberation |
If a thing be really good, it can be shown to be such.
Literature, taken in all its bearings, forms the grand line of demarcation between the human and the animal kingdoms.
Individual | Judgment | Little |
I hope that we shall have leisure from war, -- war commercial, as well as war of the bullet and the bayonet leisure from the knowledge that darkens counsel leisure above all from the greed of money, and the craving for that overwhelming distinction that money now brings I believe that, as we have even now partly achieved liberty, so we shall achieve equality, and best of all, fraternity, and so have leisure from poverty and all its griping, sordid cares.
Ishvarakrishna, aka Iśvarakṛṣṇa NULL
From the vaikrita form of individuation proceeds the eleven-fold set characterized by goodness (sattva); from the bhutadi form of individuation proceed the subtle elements (tanmatras). In this, darkness (tamas) dominates. Both of these proceed from taijasa ahankara, in which rajas dominates.
There is no mockery like the mockery of that spirit which looks around in the world and believes that all is emptiness.
When a teacher of the future comes to point out to the youth of America how the highest rewards of intellect and devotion can be gained, he may say to them, not by subtlety and intrigue not by wire pulling and demagoguery not by the arts of popularity not by skill and shiftiness in following expediency but by being firm in devotion to the principles of manhood and the application of morals and the courage of righteousness in the public life of our country by being a man without guile and without fear, without selfishness, and with devotion to duty, devotion to his country.
Better | Character | Evil | Folly | Government | Ignorance | Indifference | Indolence | Knowledge | Law | Life | Life | Little | Mind | Nature | Responsibility | Suffering | Time | World | Wrong | Government |
She bears a duke's revenues on her back, and in her heart she scorns our poverty.
Clever, ambitious, and always in search of greater efficiency, we Americans have, in two short centuries, created a world of push button, round the clock comfort for ourselves. The basic needs of humanity - food, clothing, shelter, entertainment, transportation, and even sexual pleasure - no longer need to be personally laboured for or ritualized or even understood. All these things are available to us now for mere cash. Or credit. Which means that nobody needs to know how to do anything anymore, except the one narrow skill that will earn enough money to pay for the conveniences and services of modern living. But in replacing every challenge with a short cut we seem to have lost something and Eustace isn't the only person feeling that loss. We are an increasingly depressed and anxious people - and not for nothing. Arguably, all these modern conveniences have been adopted to save us time. But time for what? Having created a system that tends to our every need without causing us undue exertion or labor, we can now fill those hours with?
As I got older, I discovered that nothing within me cried out for a baby. My womb did not seem to have come equipped with that famously ticking clock. Unlike so many of my friends, I did not ache with longing whenever I saw an infant. (Though I did ache with longing, it is true, whenever I saw a good used-book shop)
Contentment | Distress | Focus | Friend | Global | Search | Sorrow | Suffering | Unhappiness | World | Trouble |
We're already separated that's official but there's still a window of hope left open that perhaps someday we could give things another try.
The search for God is a reversal of the normal, mundane worldly order. in search for God, you revert from what attracts you and swim toward that which is difficult. you abandon your comforting and familiar habits with the hope (the mere hope!) that something greater will be offered you in return for what you have given up... if we truly knew all the answers in advance as to the meaning of life and the nature of God and the destiny of our souls, our belief would not be a leap of faith and it would not be a courageous act of humanity ; it would just be... a prudent insurance policy.
Contentment | Search |