This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Jefferson Davis, known as Jeff Davis
Truthfulness is a corner-stone of character, and if it be not firmly laid in youth, there will ever after be a weak spot in the foundation.
John Denham, fully Sir John Denham
Be just in all thy actions, and if join’d with those that are not, never change thy mind.
Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing.
If you make an effort to help everyone you meet, you will feel close to everyone. A stranger is someone you have not yet helped. Doing acts of kindness for everyone you can fills your world with friends and loved ones.
Quiet and sincere sympathy is often the most welcome and efficient consolation to the afflicted. Said a wise man to one in deep sorrow, "I did not come to comfort you; God only can do that; but I did come to say how deeply and tenderly I feel for you in your affliction."
Affliction | Character | Comfort | Consolation | God | Man | Quiet | Sorrow | Sympathy | Wise | God |
The mixing bowl of friendship, the love of one for the other, must be tempered. Love must not touch the marrow of the soul. Our affections must be breakable chains that we can cast them off or tighten them.
Some people gauge their value by what they own. But in reality the entire concept of ownership of possessions is based on an illusion. When you obtain a material object, it does not become part of you. Ownership is merely your right to use specific objects whenever you wish and that no one has a right to take them away from you. How unfortunate is the person who has an ambition to cleave to something impossible to cleave to. Such a person will not obtain what he desires and will experience suffering.
Ambition | Character | Experience | Illusion | Object | People | Possessions | Reality | Right | Suffering | Will | Ambition | Value |
Jeff Donnell, born Jean Marie Donnell
The man who follows the crowd will never be followed by a crowd.
Clarence Dykstra, fully Clarence Addison Dykstra
Men cannot long live hopefully unless they are embarked upon some great unifying enterprise - one for which they may pledge their lives, their fortunes and their honor.
George Eliot, pen name of Mary Ann or Marian Evans
Susceptible persons are more affected by a change of tone than by unexpected words.
Perhaps the summary of good-breeding may be reduced to this rule. “Behave unto all men as you would they should behave to you.” This will most certainly oblige us to treat all mankind with the utmost civility and respect, there being nothing that we desire more than to be treated so by them.
Character | Civility | Desire | Good | Mankind | Men | Nothing | Respect | Rule | Will |
In cities no one is quiet but many are lonely; in the country, people are quiet but few are lonely.