This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
We travel together, passengers on a little spaceship, dependent on its vulnerable reserves of air and soil; all committed for our safety to its security and peace; preserved from annihilation only by the care, the work and, I will say, the love we give our fragile craft.
Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.
Defense | Government | Property | Reality | Security |
It is difficult to keep quiet if you have nothing to do.
The best remedy for disturbances is to let them run their course, for so they quiet down.
Quiet |
Charles Dickens, fully Charles John Huffam Dickens
When the dust of evening had come on, and not a sound disturbed the sacred stillness of the place, when the bright moon poured in her light on tomb and monument, on pillar, wall, and arch, and most of all (it seemed to them) upon her quiet grave - in that calm time, when all outward things and inward thoughts teem with assurances of immortality, and worldly hopes and fears are humbled in the dust before them, then, with tranquil and submissive hearts they turned away, and left the child with God.
God | Grave | Immortality | Light | Quiet | Sacred | Sound | Time | Child |
Dennis Genpo Merzel, aka Genpo Merzel Roshi
To begin with, it is just One Mind, all One; then we generate all the boundaries and definitions. As soon as we define ourselves in relation to another we feel more comfortable, because now we know how to be and to act. To go into a situation completely ignorant of our role is very scary. We really have to trust ourselves then. But how can we trust if we do not know who we are? So we fall back on some definition of ourselves and put our trust in that... We lose our identity when we lose our definition. We do not realize it, but that is a wonderful, extraordinary happening, because for a time we are free of our boundaries. For a moment we are nobody, but that is just too frightening. So in order to grab on to some definition, a false sense of security and comfort, what do we do right away? We get into another relationship. At least in relationship, even if it is not working for us, we know who we are.
Comfort | Mind | Order | Relationship | Right | Security | Sense | Time | Trust |
The only security is courage.
The preservation of peace and the improvement of the lot of all people require us to have faith in the rationality of humans. If we have this faith and if we pursue understanding, we have not the promise but at least the possibility of success. We should not be misled by promises. Humanity in all its history has repeatedly escaped disaster by a hair’s breadth. Total security has never been available to anyone. To expect it is unrealistic; to imagine that it can exist is to invite disaster.
Faith | History | Humanity | Improvement | Peace | People | Promise | Rationality | Security | Success | Understanding |
You need not do anything. Remain sitting at your table and listen. You need not even listen, just wait. And you need not even wait. Just become quiet and still and solitary and the world will offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice. It will roll in ecstasy at your feet.
You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.
Human race | Patriotism | Quiet | Race | World |
The problem with worrying about your security in the future is that you feel insecure in the present.
Harry Browne, fully Harry Edson Browne
When you know that you're capable of dealing with whatever comes, you have the only security the world has to offer.
Henry David Thoreau, born David Henry Thoreau
The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation.
Desperation | Men | Quiet | Resignation |
Freedom is not a luxury that we can indulge in when at last we have security and prosperity and enlightenment; it is, rather, antecedent to all of these, for without it we can have neither security nor prosperity nor enlightenment.
Enlightenment | Freedom | Luxury | Prosperity | Security |