This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Miguel de Unamuno, fully Miguel de Unamuno y Jogo
The most tragic thing in the world and in life... is love. Love is the child of illusion and the parent of disillusion; love is consolation in desolation; it is the sole medicine against death, for it is death's brother.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, native form is Csíkszentmihályi Mihály
Those who seek consolation in existing churches often pay for their peace of mind with a tacit agreement to ignore a great deal of what is known about the way the world works.
Consolation | Mind | Peace | World |
The moment when a man's head drops off is seldom or never, I am inclined to think, precisely the most agreeable of his life. Nevertheless, like the greater part of our misfortunes, even so serious a contingency brings its remedy and consolation with it, if the sufferer will but make the best, rather than the worst, of the accident which has befallen him.
Accident | Consolation | Will |
Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
At times life seems to be a cruel game. The only justification for it is that in reality it is only a dream. That is why there are so many differences in the world. Some people are poor, some are rich, some healthy, some sick, and so on. You have had many experiences through many incarnations and you will have others in future incarnations, but they should not frighten you. You must play all parts in the motion picture of life, inwardly saying: 'I am Spirit.' This is the great consolation that wisdom gives us.
Consolation | Future | Justification | Life | Life | People | Play | Reality | Will | Wisdom |
Pierre Abelard, aka Abailard or Abaelard or Habalaarz
Often the hearts of men and women are stirred, as likewise they are soothed in their sorrows, more by example than by words. And therefore, because I too have known some consolation from speech had with one who was a witness thereof, am I now minded to write of the sufferings which have sprung out of my misfortunes, for the eyes of one who, though absent, is of himself ever a consoler. This I do so that, in comparing your sorrows with mine, you may discover that yours are in truth nought, or at the most but of small account, and so shall you come to bear them more easily.
I do not at all believe in human freedom in the philosophical sense… Schopenhauer’s saying, ‘A man can do what he wants, but not will what he wants,’ has been a very real inspiration to me since my youth; it has been a continual consolation in the face of life’s hardships, my own and others’, and an unfailing wellspring of tolerance. This realization mercifully mitigates the easily paralyzing sense of responsibility and prevents us from taking ourselves and other people too seriously; it is conducive to a view of life which, in part, gives humor its due.
Consolation | Freedom | Humor | Inspiration | Life | Life | Man | People | Responsibility | Sense | Will |
Ralph Ellison, fully Ralph Waldo Ellison
The blues is an impulse to keep the painful details and episodes of a brutal experience alive in one's aching consciousness, to finger its jagged grain, and to transcend it, not by the consolation of philosophy but by squeezing from it a near-tragic, near-comic lyricism. As a form, the blues is an autobiographical chronicle of personal catastrophe expressed lyrically.
Consolation | Experience | Impulse | Philosophy |
It is in the time of trouble, when some to whom we may have looked for consolation and encouragement regard us with coldness, and others, perhaps, treat us with hostility, that the warmth of the friendly heart and the support of the friendly hand acquire increased value and demand additional gratitude.
Consolation | Heart | Regard | Time | Value |
Rose Macauley, fully Dame Emilie Rose Macaulay
As to the family, I have never understood how that fits in with the other ideals--or indeed, why it should be an ideal at all. A group of closely related persons living under one roof; it is a convenience, often a necessity, sometimes a pleasure, sometimes the reverse; but who first exalted it as admirable, an almost religious ideal?
Saint Francis of Assisi, born Giovanni Francesco di Bernardone NULL
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred . . . let me sow love. Where there is injury . . . pardon. Where there is doubt . . . faith. Where there is despair . . . hope. Where there is darkness . . . light. Where there is sadness . . . joy. O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek To be consoled . . . as to console, To be understood . . . as to understand; To be loved . . . as to love, For It is in giving . . . that we receive. It is in pardoning . . . that we are pardoned, It is in dying . . . that we are born to eternal life.
Consolation | Heaven |
Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
Sensible satisfaction is inconstant and very quick to fail.
Consolation | Contemplation | God | Knowledge | Love | Nothing | Science | Soul | Time | God | Contemplation |
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
His path has been trodden from the ages and from all generations by the cross and by death. How is it with you that the afflictions on the path seem to you to be off the path? Do you not wish to follow the steps of the saints? Or have you plans for devising some way of your own, and of journeying therein without suffering.
Consolation | God | Means | Wrong | God |
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
No man has been entrusted with great things without having first been tried in small ones.
Consolation | Receive |
John Chrysostom, fully Saint John Chrysostom
Happiness can only be achieved by looking inward & learning to enjoy whatever life has and this requires transforming greed into gratitude.
Abundance | Age | Cheerfulness | Consolation | Despise | Love | Means | Patience | Sacred | World |
You know, Monsieur, that, although the contemplative life is more perfect than the active life, it is not, however, more so than one which embraces at the same time contemplation and action, as does yours, by God's grace.
Affliction | Consolation | Need | Tomorrow | Will |
You must understand that we have always considered the writing of books a hindrance to our work, and that for this reason the custom was not to be introduced into the Company. However, since no rule, however general, does not have some exception, we shall see whether it is advisable to have yours printed.
Consolation | Misfortune | Misfortune |
You know that you yourself are not always in the same state. If you are exact today, closely united to God, and a consolation to the whole house, tomorrow you will be out of sorts, indolent, and a source of affliction to others. Then you will need their support, as you have supported them.
Consolation | Service |
Sigmund Freud, born Sigismund Schlomo Freud
Thus we obtain our concept of the unconscious from the theory of repression. The repressed is the prototype of the unconscious for us.
Care | Childhood | Children | Consolation | Insignificance | Life | Life | Men | Necessity | Need | Object | Position | Purpose | Purpose | Troubles | Will | Child |
Alphonsus Liguori, fully Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori
Your God is ever beside you - indeed, He is even within you.
Consolation | Death | Life | Life | Strength | Time | Will |