This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The end and aim of all education is the development of character.
Character development is the great, if not the sole, aim of education.
In the destiny of every moral being there is an object more worthy of God than happiness. It is character. And the grand aim of man's creation is the development of grand character - and grand character is, by its very nature, the product of probationary discipline.
Character | Destiny | Discipline | God | Man | Nature | Object | God |
The earth we live on is so small that even if someone was honored by everyone on our planet it is still insignificant. Also, a person’s lifetime is so short that even if he received honor and approval his entire life, it is so short in comparison with eternity. This is the ultimate success an approval-seeker can hope for, but the reality is that even if you spend you entire life trying to win the approval of others, only a small number of people will know and approve of you. The approval you do gain lasts a very short time and is soon forgotten as if it never was.
Character | Earth | Eternity | Honor | Hope | Life | Life | People | Reality | Success | Time | Will | Approval |
Before we are predators, prey, lovers, parents and suckling infants, let alone fellow citizens, we are living creatures actively embedded in the world.
There is nothing a man can less afford to leave at home than his conscience or his good habits; for it is not to be denied that travel is, in its immediate circumstances, unfavorable to habits of self-discipline, regulation of thought, sobriety of conduct, and dignity of character. Indeed, one of the great lessons of travel is the discovery how much our virtues owe to the support of constant occupation, to the influence of public opinion, and to the force of habit; a discovery very dangerous, if it proceed from an actual yielding to temptations resisted at home, and not from a consciousness of increased power put forth in withstanding them.
Character | Circumstances | Conduct | Conscience | Consciousness | Dignity | Discipline | Discovery | Force | Good | Habit | Influence | Man | Nothing | Occupation | Opinion | Power | Public | Regulation | Self | Thought | Yielding | Discovery |
Rabbi Eliezer ben Isaac Papo, aka "ha-Kosesh" or "The Saint"
Frequently when we get angry at someone we fail to realize that he sees the situation much differently than we do. While we think he is acting wrongly, he views his behavior as correct. Since he is acting in a manner he considers proper, we should not condemn him and become angry.
The goal of wisdom is laughter and play - not the kind that one sees in little children who do not yet have the faculty of reason, but the kind that is developed in those who have grown mature through both time and understanding. If someone has experienced the wisdom that can only be heard from oneself, learned from oneself, and created from oneself, he does not merely participate in laughter: he becomes laughter itself.
Character | Children | Laughter | Little | Play | Reason | Time | Understanding | Wisdom |
The essential in this time of moral poverty is to create enthusiasm.
Character | Enthusiasm | Poverty | Time |