This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
If there be one principle more deeply rooted than any other in the mind of every American, it is, that we should have nothing to do with conquest.
I sincerely believe, with you, that banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
Immense hidden powers seem to lurk in the unconscious depths of even the most common man - indeed, of all people without exception. It is these powers, when put under pressure, that are responsible for all great creative efforts. The men who make history are those who - consciously or unconsciously - turn the switch on the inner switchboards of human character. Pour out all your fears and anxieties, malicious joy and greed and hatred, and you will be astonished at the terrific amount of power which is pent up in your unconscious mind. We can release this power and transform it from negative into positive power, only by bringing into the open, into the light of consciousness, and by accepting ourselves as we are, even though the mountains of debts seem to crush us. This is the principle of honesty. And it is clear that it can be applied only if connected with the principle of faith.
Character | Consciousness | Faith | Greed | History | Honesty | Joy | Light | Man | Men | Mind | People | Power | Will |
Peter Kropotkin, fully Prince Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin
Anarchism (from the Greek… contrary to authority), the name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government – Harmony in such a society not being obtained by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted form the sake of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilized being.
Authority | Conduct | Government | Harmony | Law | Life | Life | Obedience | Society | Submission | Society | Government |
The principle of causality, limited exclusively to explaining the interconnection of phenomena, and void of any metaphysical significance, has become incapable of making the mind pass from the world to God. Man’s mind, if not his heart, has become godless, and knowledge, or science, has dethroned wisdom.
God | Heart | Knowledge | Man | Mind | Phenomena | Science | Wisdom | World |
Kegley’s Principle of Change: It is easier to behave your way into a new way of thinking than to think your way into a new way of behaving.
In the field of modern cosmology, the first principle is called “the Cosmological Principle.” It says that the universe has no center, that it has the same properties throughout. Every place in the universe has, in this sense, equal rights. How can the human race, which has evolved in a universe of such fundamental equality, fail to strive for a society without violence and terror? How can we fail to build a world in which the rights due to every human being from birth are respected?
Birth | Equality | Human race | Race | Rights | Sense | Society | Terror | Universe | World | Society |
“The happiest person is the person who thinks the most interesting thoughts.” This definition places happiness where it belongs - within and not without. The principle of happiness should be like the principle of virtue: it should not be dependent upon things, but be a part of personality.
Personality | Virtue | Virtue | Happiness |
Those words, “temperate and moderate,” are words either of political cowardice, or of cunning, or seduction. A thing moderately good, if not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue, but moderation in principle is a species of vice.
Cowardice | Cunning | Good | Moderation | Temper | Virtue | Virtue | Words | Moderation |
Maximilien Robespierre, fully Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre
If virtue be the spring of popular government in times of peace, the spring of that government during a revolution is virtue combined with terror: virtue, without which terror is destructive; terror, without which virtue is impotent. Terror is the only justice prompt, severe and inflexible; it is then an emanation of virtue; it is less a distinct principle than a natural consequence of the general principle of democracy, applied to the most pressing wants of the country.
Democracy | Government | Justice | Peace | Revolution | Terror | Virtue | Virtue | Wants | Government |
The knowledge that mankind needs is not the way or principle which has an absolute existence, but the particular truths for here and now and for particular individuals. Absolute truth is imaginary, abstract, vague, without evidence, and cannot be demonstrated.
Absolute | Abstract | Evidence | Existence | Knowledge | Mankind | Truth | Truths |
Karl Wilheim Friedrich Schlegel, later Karl Wilhelm Friedrich von Schlegel
It is precisely the conflict between the good or divine principle, on the one hand, and the evil or adverse principle on the other, which constitutes the meaning of human life and human history, from the beginning to the end of time.
Beginning | Evil | Good | History | Life | Life | Meaning | Time |
Eckhart Tolle, born Ulrich Leonard Tolle
The primary factor in creation is consciousness. Our state of consciousness creates our world. Consciousness itself is timeless and therefore does not evolve. Consciousness is the intelligence, the organizing principle behind the arising of form. Although the unmanifested realm of pure consciousness could be considered another dimension, it is not separate from this dimension of form. Form and formlessness interpenetrate. The unmanifested flows into this dimension as awareness, inner space, Presence.
Awareness | Consciousness | Intelligence | Space | World |
Leo Tolstoy, aka Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy or Tolstoi
It is easier to write ten volumes of philosophy than to put one principle into practice.
Philosophy | Practice |