This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Saint Augustine, aka Augustine of Hippo, St. Austin, Bishop of Hippo NULL
And men go abroad to admire the heights of mountains, the mighty waves of the sea, the broad tides of rivers, the compass of the ocean, and the circuits of the stars, yet pass over the mystery of themselves without a thought.
Labor | Righteousness |
Saint Gregory, aka Pope Gregory I, St. Gregory the Dialogist, "Gregory the Great" NULL
We make Idols of our concepts, but Wisdom is born of wonder.
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
Walk before God in simplicity and not with knowledge. Simplicity is accompanied by faith; but subtle and intricate deliberations, by conceit; and conceit is accompanied by separation from God.
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
Be a herald of God’s goodness, for God rules over you, unworthy though you are. Although your debt to Him is so very great, He is not seen exacting payment from you; and from the small works you do, He bestows great rewards upon you. Do not call God just, for His justice is not manifest in things concerning you.
Saint Maximus the Confessor NULL
It is said that the highest state of prayer is reached when the intellect goes beyond the flesh and the world, and while praying is utterly free from matter and form. He who maintains this state has truly attained unceasing prayer.”
Distinguish | Fighting | God | Hate | Important | Labor | Practice | Sin | Strength | Struggle | Virtue | Virtue | Weakness | Wickedness | God | Learn | Think |
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
The saints in heaven will not supplicate with prayer when their intellects have been consumed up by the Spirit, but rather with awe struck wonder they dwell in that gladdening glory.
Labor | Recompense |
Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
The soul is drawing nearer to Him, and so she has greater experience within herself of the void of God, of very heavy darkness, and of spiritual fire which dries up and purges her, so that thus purified she may be united with Him.
Body | Contemplation | Frailties | Freedom | God | Labor | Sense | Soul | Spirit | God | Contemplation |
John Chrysostom, fully Saint John Chrysostom
They think that when they enter in here [the church], that they enter into our presence [the clergy], they think that they hear from us. They do not lay to heart, they do not consider that they are entering the presence of God, that it is He who addresses them. For when the Reader standing up says Thus says the Lord, and the Deacon stands and imposes silence on all, he does not say this as doing honor to the Reader but to honor Him who speaks to all through him [the Reader]. If they knew that it was God who through His prophet speaks these things, they would cast away all their pride. For if rulers are addressing them, they do not allow their minds to wander, much else would they when God is speaking. We are ministers, beloved. We speak not our own things, but the things of God. Letters coming from heaven are read every day.… These letters are sent from God; therefore let us enter with becoming reverence into the churches and let us hearken with fear to the things here said.
I agree with you, too, that it is hardly fair to have our people crowded out of employment by those who simply come here for the purpose of working at low wages -- higher than those they may be accustomed to in their own countries-- and then after a while return there. I am also free to say to you, however, that I do not see how a remedy is to be obtained without closing the ports entirely, and as to that there is considerable division of opinion. It may not be amiss to call attention to the fact that the introduction of one machine in a trade may throw more men out of employment than the Greeks who come here even in the manner which you describe.
Evidence | Hope | Labor | Life | Life | Men | Past | Prejudice | Race | Receive | Think |
Among the things we advocate is that women should have equal suffrage with men. . . . We not only work for equality of suffrage, but work to fight and obtain equal wages for her.
Either the trade unionists are right or they are wrong. If they are wrong, every one of us who counts himself a trade unionist ought to be shunted aside and thrown overboard. If we are right, we ought to stick and fight and take whatever consequences may come, conscious in the knowledge and conviction that the right will prevail.
Democracy | Freedom | Good | Ideals | Labor | Object | War |
What does labor want? We want more schoolhouses and less jails; more books and less arsenals; more learning and less vice; more leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures, to make manhood more noble, womanhood more beautiful, and childhood more happy and bright.
Better | Books | Childhood | Consideration | Fate | Happy | Justice | Labor | Learning | Leisure | Society | Work | Fate | Society |
If, in all this civilization, and if, in all the wealth produced, if in all this great fertile country of ours . . . we assert first, that wherever and whenever there be one human soul in our country walking the streets unable to find the opportunity to perform work and service to society, to demand in return for it the decent livelihood with opportunities for the cultivation of the best that is in us, if there is that opportunity denied to any one single man or woman in all this country, to him or to her all our boasted civilization is a sham.
Better | Dawn | Day | Labor | Man | Need | Strength | Time | Wants | Will | Work | Afraid | Friends | Old |
Strikes have their evils but they have their good points also, and with proper management, with proper organization, strikes do generally result to the advantage of labor, and in very few instances do they result in injury to the workingmen, whether organized or unorganized. . . . Strikes ought to be, and in well-organized trades they are, the last means which workingmen resort to to protect themselves against the almost never satisfied greed of the employers. Besides this, the strike is, in many instances, the only remedy within our reach as long as legislation is entirely indifferent to the interests of labor.
Labor |
I look to the proposition of labor to reduce the daily hours of toil of the working people of our country as the greatest proposition that has ever been offered to the Congress of the United States and to the employers of the United States; calculated to be of more benefit for the whole people of our country; calculated to be the greatest safety for the perpetuation of republican institutions, a greater safety for the progress, the success of the people of our country -- all classes -- of attaining a position as great and grand and successful in industry, in commerce, in intelligence, in humanity, in civilization than all the other propositions that have been submitted to this or any other previous Congress of the United States.
I want to tell you, Socialists, that I have studied your philosophy; read your works upon economics, and not the meanest of them; studied your standard works, both in English and German -- have not only read, but studied them. I have heard your orators and watched the work of your movement the world over. I have kept close watch upon your doctrines for thirty years; have been closely associated with many of you, and know how you think and what you propose. I know, too, what you have up your sleeve. And I want to say that I am entirely at variance with your philosophy. I declare to you, I am not only at variance with your doctrines, but with your philosophy. Economically you are unsound; socially, you are wrong; industrially, you are an impossibility.
Better | Conduct | Cost | Industry | Labor | Will | Negotiation | Think | Understand |
In my opinion, we have been tolerant too long of men who have gone about the country declaring the size of their hearts, and repeatedly offering up their necks for the hangmen's noose as their stock in trade for practical work in the labor movement.
The attempt to divert the thoughts and interest of the American people from the wrongs that need attention at home, by occupying them with foreign complications of any kind, is criminal folly. The idea that we shall escape the duties which we owe to the people by becoming a nation of conquerors, is clearly in the minds of prominent advocates of expansion and imperialism. They have indicated that they hope to see changes in our boundaries, talk of alliances and wars, and perhaps war and conquests, all to keep the workers and the lovers of reforms and simple justice diverted and powerless to dig out abuses and cure existing injustice. . . . Imperialism points to large armaments and more frequent wars. It means means greater demands upon the workers in taxes, blood, and life. It tends to the more frequent and unblushing use of force against the weak and lowly. It subordinates right and justice to an unwise or blind greed of gain, and the exploitation of islands whose millions are to be made the tools, willing or unwilling, of the few thousand. And this is what some men call a cure for social unrest!