This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
In civilized life, where the happiness, and indeed almost the existence, of man depends so much upon the opinion of his fellow-men, he is constantly acting a studied part. The bold and peculiar traits of native character are refined away or softened down by the leveling influence of what is termed good-breeding, and he practices so many petty deceptions and affects so many generous sentiments for the purposes of popularity that it is difficult to distinguish his real from his artificial character.
Character | Distinguish | Existence | Influence | Life | Life | Man | Opinion | Popularity | Wisdom |
Philip J. Hilts, fully Philip James Hilts
In all human activities, it is not ideas or machines that dominate; it is people. I have heard people speak of “the effect of personality on science.” But this is a backward thought. Rather, we should talk about he effect of science on personalities. Science is not the dispassionate analysis of impartial data. It is the human, and thus passionate, exercise of skill and sense on such date. Science is not an exercise in objectivity, but, more accurately, an exercise in which objectivity is prized.
Ideas | Machines | Objectivity | People | Personality | Science | Sense | Skill | Thought | Wisdom |
Herbert Hoover, fully Herbert Clark Hoover
Economic depression cannot be cured by legislative action or executive pronouncement. Economic wounds must be healed by the action of the cells of the economic body, the producers and consumers themselves.
Action | Body | Depression | Wisdom |
There is a broad distinction between character and reputation, for one may be destroyed by slander, while the other can never be harmed, save by its possessor. Reputation is in no man's keeping. You and I cannot determine what other men shall think and say about us. We can only determine what they ought to think of us and say about us.
Character | Distinction | Man | Men | Reputation | Slander | Wisdom | Think |
Wealth brings noble opportunities, and competence is a proper object of pursuit; but wealth, and even competence, may be bought at too high a price. Wealth itself has no moral attribute. It is not money, but the love of money, which is the root of all evil. It is the relation between wealth and the mind and the character of its possessor which is the essential thing.
Character | Competence | Evil | Love of money | Love | Mind | Money | Object | Price | Wealth | Wisdom |
A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be your constant companion of your walks.
All government, all exercise of power, no matter in what form, which is not based in love and directed by knowledge, is a tyranny.
No man ever made a great discovery without the exercise of the imagination.
Discovery | Imagination | Man | Wisdom | Discovery |
Music is a language by whose means messages are elaborated, that such messages can be understood by the many but sent out only by few, and that it alone among all the languages unites the contradictory character of being at once intelligible and untranslatable - these facts make the creator of music a being like the gods.
We are born with faculties and powers capable of almost anything, such as at least would carry us further than can be easily imagined; but it is only the exercise of those powers which gives us ability and skill in anything, and leads us towards perfection.
Ability | Perfection | Skill | Wisdom |
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it.
Government | People | Right | Wisdom |
The institutions of a country depend in great measure on the nature of its soil and situation. Many of the wants of man are awakened or supplied by these circumstances. To these wants, manners, laws, and religion must shape and accommodate themselves. The division of land, and the rights attached to it, alter with the soil; the laws relating to its produce, with its fertility. The manners of its inhabitants are in various ways modified by its position. The religion of a miner is not the same as the faith of a shepherd, nor is the character of the ploughman so war-like as that of the hunter. The observant legislator follows the direction of all these various circumstances. the knowledge of the natural advantages or defects of a country thus form an essential part of political science and history.
Character | Circumstances | Defects | Faith | History | Knowledge | Land | Man | Manners | Nature | Position | Religion | Rights | Science | Wants | War | Wisdom |
All too much of the wage structure has been based on the time workers put in, rather than upon the product put out. The consumer dollar has no interest in how much time it buys - only in the character and quality of the product itself.
Can a man control his future? Yes. Despite the system they live under, men everywhere have, I believe, more power over the future than ever before. The important thing is that we must choose to exercise it. What we do today determines how the world shall go, for tomorrow is made up of the sum total of today's experiences... Far from feeling hopeless or helpless, we must seize every opportunity, however small, to help the world around us toward peace, productivity and human brotherhood.
Brotherhood | Control | Future | Important | Man | Men | Opportunity | Peace | Power | System | Tomorrow | Wisdom | World |
Paramananda, fully Swami Paramananda, born Suresh Chandra Guha-Thakurta NULL
One cannot have faith without optimism. Faith and hope are inseparable. Depression is a great obstacle in the spiritual life and we must strive to conquer it... Cheerfulness is one of the essential spiritual qualities we must guard ourselves against dejection, self-denunciation, or even feeling a little down-hearted... Dejection invariably distorts our vision - it magnifies our troubles.
Cheerfulness | Dejection | Depression | Faith | Hope | Life | Life | Little | Optimism | Qualities | Self | Troubles | Vision | Wisdom | Obstacle |