This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
If your God dislikes idolatry, why does He not destroy the idols and so put temptation out of the way?
Destroy | God | Temptation | God | Temptation |
Rainer Maria Rilke, full name René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke
First a childhood, limitless and without renunciation or goals. O unselfconscious joy. Then suddenly terror, barriers, schools, drudgery, and collapse into temptation and loss. Defiance. The one bent becomes the bender, and thrusts upon others that which it suffered. Loved, feared, rescuer, fighter, winner and conqueror, blow by blow. And then alone in cold, light, open space, yet still deep within the mature erected form, a gasping for the clear air of the first one, the old one... Then God leaps out from behind his hiding place.
God | Temptation | God | Old | Temptation |
Ring Lardner, fully Ringgold "Ring" Wilmer Lardner
A good many young writers make the mistake of enclosing a stamped, self-addressed envelope, big enough for the manuscript to come back in. This is too much of a temptation to the editor.
Enough | Good | Mistake | Temptation | Temptation |
If there is no God, why be good?...When a religious person puts it to me in this way (and many of them do), my immediate temptation is to issue the following challenge:
Temptation | Following | Temptation |
Richard L. Evans, fully Richard Louis Evans
If you don't want temptation to follow you, don't act as if you are interested.
Temptation | Temptation |
But the temptation to wallow and disport myself in the purple prose of the doting collector is strong, and it will need all my vigilance to resist it.
Need | Temptation | Vigilance | Will | Temptation |
I am sure that I would not make a good taxidermist; the temptation to improve upon nature would certainly be too strong for me. Think how easy it would be, when stuffing somebody's pet terrier, to slip a couple of human glass eyes into sockets, instead of the usual buttons. Then the owner would really be justified in saying that his pet looked almost human. If I were stuffing this two-headed calf, for instance, I could not resist making one head smile and the other one frown, so that they looked like masks of Comedy and Tragedy.
Comedy | Good | Nature | Smile | Temptation | Temptation | Think |
Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
May it please Thee, O Lord my God, To subdue my fierce desire. O hide Thy face from my sins and trespasses, Do not carry me off in the midst of my days, Until I shall have prepared what is needful for my way And provender for the day of my journeying, For if I go out of my world as I came, And return to my place, naked as I came forth, Wherefore was I created And called to see sorrow? Better were it I had remained where I was Than to have come hither to increase and multiply sin. I beseech Thee, O God, judge me by Thine attribute of mercy, And not by Thine anger lest Thou wither me. For what is man that Thou shouldst judge him? And how shalt Thou weigh a drifting vapour? When Thou placest it in the balance, It shall be neither heavy nor light, And what shall it profit Thee to weigh the air? From the day of his birth man is hard-pressed and harrowed, "Stricken, smitten of God and afflicted." His youth is chaff driven in the wind, And his latter end is flying straw, And his life withereth like a herb, And God joineth in hunting him. From the day he cometh forth from his mother’s womb His night is sorrow and his day is sighing. If to-day he is exalted, To-morrow he shall crawl with worms. A grain of chaff putteth him to flight, And a thorn woundeth him. If he is sated, he waxeth wicked, And if he is hungry, he sinneth for a loaf of bread. His steps are swift to pursue riches, But he forgetteth Death, who is after him. At the time he is straitened, he multiplieth his promises, And scattereth his words, And is profuse in vows, But when he is enlarged, He keepeth back his word and forgetteth his vows, And strengtheneth the bars of his gates, While Death is in his chambers, And he increaseth guards in every quarter While the foe lieth ambushed in his very apartment. As for the wolf, the fence shall not restrain it From coming to the flock. Man entereth the world, And knoweth not why, And rejoiceth, And knoweth not wherefore, And liveth, And knoweth not how long. In his childhood he walketh in his own stubbornness, And when the spirit of lust beginneth in its season To stir him up to gather power and wealth, Then he journeyeth from his place To ride in ships And to tread the deserts, And to carry his life to dens of lions, Adventuring it among wild beasts; And when he imagineth that great is his glory And that mighty is the spoil of his hand, Quietly stealeth the spoiler upon him, And his eyes are opened and there is naught. At every moment he is destined to troubles, That pass and return, And at every hour evils, And at every moment chances, And on every day terrors. If for an instant he stand in security, Suddenly disaster will come upon him, Either war shall come and the sword will smite him, Or the bow of brass transpierce him; Or sorrows will overpower him, Or the presumptuous billows flow over him, Or sickness and steadfast evils shall find him, Till he becometh a burden on his own soul, And shall find the gall of serpents in his honey. And when his pain increaseth His glory decreaseth, And youths make mock of him, And infants rule him, And he becometh a burden to the issue of his loins, And all who know him become estranged from him. And when his hour hath come, he passeth from the courts of his house to the court of Death, And from the shadow of his chambers to the shadow of Death. And he shall strip off his broidery and his scarlet And shall put on corruption and the worm, And lie down in the dust And return to the foundation from which he came. And man, whom these things befall, When shall he find a time for repentance To scour away the rust of his perversion? For the day is short and the work manifold, And the task-masters irate, Hurrying and scurrying, And Time laughs at him And the Master of the House presses. Therefore I beseech Thee, O my God, Remember the distresses that come upon man, And if I have done evil Do Thou me good at my latter end, Nor requite measure for measure To man whose sins are measureless, And whose death is a joyless departure.
Better | Deeds | Evil | Guile | Land | Lord | Nothing | Right | Service | Temptation | Will | Deeds | Temptation | Think |
The kinds of spiritual practices we can undertake are limitless. However, ultimately the form is less important than these factors: the commitment to practice, the ability to keep returning to the intention, the attitude one brings to the uncontrollable and the ability to transfer the benefits of the practice into how we live our lives, how we relate to ourselves and others, how free we become to embody the values and ideals we embrace in our minds, how we deal with temptations of all sorts. In other words we practice to live with the wisdom and compassion, which we already possess. We practice to actualize the pure soul, which God has planted with us.
Ability | Action | Anxiety | Anxiety | Attention | Body | Change | Character | Consciousness | Consequences | Desire | Focus | Forgetfulness | Generosity | Habit | Intention | Language | Meditation | Mind | Nature | Object | Order | Pain | Power | Practice | Prayer | Promise | Reality | Sabbath | Speech | Taste | Temptation | Time | Training | Unconsciousness | Torah | Temptation |
Ronald Reagan, fully Ronald Wilson Reagan
So the ... the helm is right here. And that means right in this chair for now, constitutionally, until the vice president gets here.
Evil | Good | History | Pride | Race | Right | Struggle | Temptation | Temptation |
Ronald Reagan, fully Ronald Wilson Reagan
As government expands, liberty contracts.
Family | Fear | Government | Power | Public | Temptation | Time | Will | Government | Afraid | Temptation |
Rutherford B. Hayes, fully Rutherford Birchard Hayes
One of the tests of the civilization of people is the treatment of its criminals.
Bitterness | Danger | Extreme | Government | Important | People | Public | Reform | System | Temptation | Will | Government | Danger | Temptation |
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
When we want to speak of passions collectively, we call them the world; when we want to distinguish them according to their different names, we call them the passions.
Mind | Salvation | Temptation | Temptation |
Saint Paul, aka The Apostle Paul, Paul the Apostle or Saul of Tarsus NULL
Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others.
God | Temptation | Will | God | Temptation |
God has seen fit that, since our services are useful to many persons, everyone approves them, but only when they are carried out in the spirit of Our Lord.
Confidence | Courage | Temptation | Will | Temptation |
It is true that zeal is the soul of the virtues, but most certainly, Monsieur, it must be according to knowledge, as Saint Paul says; that means: according to knowledge of experience. And because young people ordinarily do not possess this experiential knowledge, their zeal goes to excess, especially in those who have a natural asperity.
God | Temptation | God | Temptation |
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy; affectation, part of the chosen trappings of folly; the one completes a villain, the other only finishes a fop. Contempt is the proper punishment of affectation, and detestation the just consequence of hypocrisy.
Temptation | Will | Temptation |
Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
To set the mind above the appetites is the end of abstinence, which if not a virtue, is the groundwork of a virtue.
Lying | Right | Temptation | Will | Temptation |
I would rather label the whole enterprise of setting a biological value upon groups for what it is: irrelevant, intellectually unsound, and highly injurious.
Age | Children | Fault | History | Past | Survival | Temptation | Time | Worth | Fault | Temptation | Understand |