This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
By moral power we mean the power of a life and a character, the power of good and great purposes, the power which comes at length to reside in a man distinguished in some course of estimable or great conduct. No other power of man compares with this, and there is no individual who may not be measurably invested with it.
Character | Conduct | Good | Individual | Life | Life | Man | Power |
No man should part with his own individuality and become that of another.
Character | Individuality | Man | Wisdom |
Joseph Conrad, born Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski
They talk of a man betraying his country, his friends, his sweetheart. There must be a moral bond first. All a man can betray is his conscience.
Character | Conscience | Man |
A religion giving dark views of God, and infusing superstitious fear of innocent enjoyment, instead of aiding sober habits, will, by making men abject and sad, impair their moral force and prepare them for intemperance as a refuge from depression or despair.
Character | Depression | Despair | Enjoyment | Fear | Force | Giving | God | Intemperance | Men | Religion | Will |
The greatest man is he who chooses the right with invincible resolution, who resists the sorest temptations from within and without, who bears the heaviest burdens cheerfully, who is calmest in storms and most fearless under menace and frowns, whose reliance on truth, on virtue, on God, is most unfaltering. I believe this greatness to be most common among the multitude, whose names are never heard.
Character | God | Greatness | Man | Resolution | Right | Truth | Virtue | Virtue |
Cyril Connolly, fully Cyril Vernon Connolly
We hate what we fear and so where hate is, fear is lurking.
Whatever deprives a man of personal individual motive for self-improvement and robust exertion will not make him free, but on the contrary more servile and in the long run less intelligent, industrious and free, for freedom is a matter of character and will power.
Character | Freedom | Improvement | Individual | Man | Power | Self | Self-improvement | Will |
The prejudiced and obstinate man does not so much hold opinions, as his opinions hold him.