This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Pachacutec Inca Yupanqui, sometimes referred to as Pachacuti
Lost in memories of urban decay, we are leaving behind our gluttonous ways and singing songs into the eternal sky even as we wander the world alone, carrying flags of fathers who never loved us billowing over our shoulders, like new angels soaring into heaven wings thrown earthward feeling the company of all of us- pioneers of solitude- even as we wander the world alone.
Paramahansa Yogananda, born Mukunda Lal Ghosh
We don't become angels merely by the instrument of death. If we are angels now, we will be angels in the hereafter. If we are dark, negative personalities now, we will be the same after death.
Ah, there are moments for us here, when, seeing Life’s inequalities, and woe, and care, The burdens laid upon our mortal being Seem heavier than the human heart can bear. Father, perfect my trust; Let my spirit feel in death That her feet are firmly set On the rock of a living faith! For little children everywhere A joyous season still we make; We bring our precious gifts to them, Even for the dear child Jesus’ sake. For those roses bright, oh, those roses bright! I have twined them in my sister’s locks That are hid in the dust from sight. No thought within her bosom stirs, But wakes some feeling dark and dread; God keep thee from a doom like hers, Of living when the hopes are dead. O years, gone down into the past, What pleasant memories come to me Of your untroubled days of peace, And hours almost of ecstasy. There are eyes half defiant, Half meek and compliant; Black eyes, with a wondrous, witching charm To bring us good or to work us harm. Women are only told that they resemble angels when they are young and beautiful; consequently, it is their persons, not their virtues, that procure them homage.
Angels | Children | Good | Heart | Little | Mortal | Spirit | Thought | Work | Child | Thought |
Pythagoras, aka Pythagoras of Samos or Pythagoras the Samian NULL
In this theater of man's life, it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers-on.
R. H. Stoddard, fully Richard Henry Stoddard
If there is anything that will endure The eye of God because it still is pure, It is the spirit of a little child, Fresh from His hand, and therefore undefiled. Nearer the gate of Paradise than we, Our children breathe its airs, its angels see; And when they pray God hears their simple prayer, Yea, even sheathes His sword, in judgment bare
Angels | Children | God | Judgment | Little | Paradise | Spirit | Will | God |
Rainer Maria Rilke, full name René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke
If my devils are to leave me, I fear my angels will take flight as well.
Rainer Maria Rilke, full name René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke
O smile, going where? O upturned look: new, warm, receding surge of the heart--; alas, we are that surge. Does then the cosmic space we dissolve in taste of us? Do the angels reclaim only what is theirs, their own outstreamed existence, or sometimes, by accident, does a bit of us get mixed in? Are we blended in their features like the slight vagueness that complicates the looks of pregnant women? Unnoticed by them in their whirling back into themselves? (How could they notice?)
Rainer Maria Rilke, full name René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke
Lovers, if Angels could understand them, might utter strange things in the midnight air. For it seems that everything's trying to hide us. Look, the trees exist; the houses we live in still stand where they were. We only pass everything by like a transposition of air. And all combines to suppress us, partly as shame, perhaps, and partly as inexpressible hope.
Angels | Understand |
Now all the knowledge and wisdom that is in creatures, whether angels or men, is nothing else but a participation of that one eternal, immutable and increased wisdom of God, or several signatures of that one archetypal seal, or like so many multiplied reflections of one and the same face, made in several glasses, whereof some are clearer, some obscurer, some standing nearer, some further off.
Around our pillows golden ladders rise, And up and down the skies, With winged sandals shod, The angels come, and go, the Messengers of God! Nor, though they fade from us, do they depart-- It is the childly heart We walk as heretofore, Adown their shining ranks, but see them nevermore.
Angels |
Ye holy angels bright, Who wait at God's right hand, Or through the realms of light Fly at your Lord's command, Assist our song; For else the theme Too high doth seem For mortal tongue. Ye blessed souls at rest, Who ran this earthly race, And now, from sin released, Behold the Saviour's face, God's praises sound, As in his sight, With sweet delight, Ye do abound. Ye saints, who toil below, Adore your heavenly King. And onward as ye go Some joyful anthem sing; Take what he gives And praise him still, Through good or ill, Who ever lives! My soul, bear thou thy part, Triumph in God above: And with a well-tuned heart Sing thou the songs of love! Let all thy days Till life shall end, Whate'er he send, Be filled with praise.
Angels | God | Good | Heart | Life | Life | Light | Mortal | Praise | Right | Sin | God | Blessed |
Richard Feynman, fully Richard Phillips Feynman
The next question was - what makes planets go around the sun? At the time of Kepler some people answered this problem by saying that there were angels behind them beating their wings and pushing the planets around an orbit. As you will see, the answer is not very far from the truth. The only difference is that the angels sit in a different direction and their wings push inward.
Richard Wright, fully Richard Nathaniel Wright
If the stars twinkled more than usual on any given night, it meant that the angels in heaven were happy and were flitting across the doors of heaven; and since stars were merely holes ventilating heaven, the twinkling came from the angels flitting past the holes that admitted air into the holy home of God.
If we lived in a State where virtue was profitable, common sense would make us good, and greed would make us saintly. And we'd live like animals or angels in the happy land that needs no heroes. But since in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and thought, and have to choose, to be human at all... why then perhaps we must stand fast a little --even at the risk of being heroes.
Angels | Common Sense | Greed | Happy | Justice | Land | Little | Lust | Risk | Sense | Stupidity | Virtue | Virtue |
Robert Bridges, fully Robert Seymour Bridges
My delight and thy delight Walking, like two angels white, In the gardens of the night.
Angels |
Robert Southwell, also Saint Robert Southwell
A Child My Choice - Let folly praise that fancy loves, I praise and love that Child Whose heart no thought, whose tongue no word, whose hand no deed defiled. I praise Him most, I love Him best, all praise and love is His; While Him I love, in Him I live, and cannot live amiss. Love's sweetest mark, laud's highest theme, man's most desired light, To love Him life, to leave Him death, to live in Him delight. He mine by gift, I His by debt, thus each to other due; First friend He was, best friend He is, all times will try Him true. Though young, yet wise; though small, yet strong; though man, yet God He is: As wise, He knows; as strong, He can; as God, He loves to bless. His knowledge rules, His strength defends, His love doth cherish all; His birth our joy, His life our light, His death our end of thrall. Alas! He weeps, He sighs, He pants, yet do His angels sing; Out of His tears, His sighs and throbs, doth bud a joyful spring. Almighty Babe, whose tender arms can force all foes to fly, Correct my faults, protect my life, direct me when I die!
Angels | Birth | Choice | Death | Folly | Force | Friend | God | Heart | Knowledge | Life | Life | Love | Praise | Strength | Will | God | Child |
Robert Southwell, also Saint Robert Southwell
Repentant eyes are the cellars of angels, and penitent tears their sweetest wines, which the savor of life perfumeth, the taste of grace sweeteneth, and the purest colors of returning innocency highly beautifieth. This dew of devotion never falleth, but the sun of justice draweth it up, and upon what face soever it droppeth it maketh it amiable in God's eye.... No, no, the angels must still bathe themselves in the pure streams of thy eyes, and thy face shall still be set with this liquid pearl, that as out of thy tears were stroken the first sparks of thy Lord's love, so thy tears may be the oil, to nourish and feed his flame. Till death dam up the springs, they shall never cease running: and then shall thy soul be ferried in them to the harbor of life, that as by them it was first passed from sin to grace, so in them it may be wafted from grace to glory.
Angels | Death | Devotion | Grace | Justice | Life | Life | Sin | Soul | Taste | Tears |
Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
FOR A MARRIAGE - Send to the prince’s daughter Her ruddy, fair-eyed king, Like a fruitful branch he blossoms, Transplanted to a spring. Thy Torah has his worship, He runs, to taste its charms, Before Thee like a warrior, Accoutred in his arms. I day by day am waiting Salvation’s promised day, Enquiring how and whence it Will come to be my stay. Restore the tortured People To the friend of her youth divine, And bring the two together To the house of joy and wine.
Angels | Awe | Earth | Fear | Good | Greatness | Heaven | Little | Praise | Soul |