This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Maggie Ross, pen name for Martha Reeves
The pain that gives us self-knowledge, willingly sought and moved through, is at the heart of repentance of any kind. Pain is… the open space - one meaning of the ancient Hebrew word for salvation - the point of intersection and integration of our selves with one another and all the Creation.
Heart | Integration | Knowledge | Meaning | Pain | Repentance | Salvation | Self | Self-knowledge | Space |
Time, the cradle of hope, but the grave of ambition, is the stern corrector of fools, but the salutary counselor of the wise, bringing all they dread to the one, and all they desire to the other; it warns us with a voice tht even the sagest discredit too long, and the silliest believe too late. Wisdom walks before it, opportunity with it, and repentance behind it; he that has made it his friend will have little to fear from his enemies, but he that has made it his enemy will have little to hope from his friends.
Ambition | Desire | Dread | Enemy | Fear | Friend | Grave | Hope | Little | Opportunity | Repentance | Time | Will | Wisdom | Wise |
The seeds of repentance are sown in youth by pleasure, but the harvest is reaped in age by pain.
True repentance consists in the heart being broken for sin and broken from sin. Some often repent, yet never reform; they resemble a man traveling in a dangerous path, who frequently starts and stops, but never turns back.
Heart | Man | Reform | Repentance | Sin |
Our repentance is not so much regret for the evil we have done as fear of what may happen to us because of it.
Evil | Fear | Regret | Repentance |
He who cannot find time to consult his Bible will one day find he has time to be sick; he who has no time to pray must find time to die; he who can find no time to reflect is most likely to find time to sin; he who cannot find time for repentance will find an eternity in which repentance will be of no avail; he who cannot find time to work for others may find an eternity in which to suffer for himself.
Bible | Day | Eternity | Repentance | Sin | Time | Will | Work | Bible |
Henry Miller, aka Henry Valentine Miller
Remorse is impotent; it will sin again. Only repentance is strong; it can end everything.
Remorse | Repentance | Sin | Will |
When a child can be brought to tears, not from fear of punishment, but from repentance for his offense, he needs no chastisement. When the tears begin to flow from grief at one’s own conduct, be sure there is an angel nestling in the bosom.
Conduct | Fear | Grief | Offense | Punishment | Repentance | Tears | Child |
Collective sinning is a dire reality, but collective repentance is usually too diluted to be curative.
Reality | Repentance |
Saint Ambrose, born Aurelius Ambrosius NULL
True repentance is to cease from sin.
Repentance | Sin |
Of all acts of man repentance is the most divine. The greatest of all faults is to be conscious of none.
Man | Repentance |
Worldly and sensual pleasures lie, for the most part, are short, false, and deceitful. Like drunkenness, they revenge the jolly madness of one hour with the sad repentance of many.
Madness | Repentance | Revenge |
The only vice that cannot be forgiven is hypocrisy. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy.
Hypocrisy | Repentance | Vice |
True repentance involves a change of heart and not just a change of behavior
Change | Heart | Repentance |