This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Idleness is the hot-bed of temptation, the cradle of disease, the waster of time, the canker-worm of felicity. To him that has no employment, life in a little while will have no novelty; and when novelty is laid in the grave, the funeral of comfort will soon follow.
Character | Comfort | Disease | Grave | Idleness | Life | Life | Little | Novelty | Temptation | Time | Will | Novelty |
Enthusiasm is a kind of faith that has been set afire.
Character | Enthusiasm | Faith | Wisdom |
Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus
Happiness is no other than soundness and perfection of mind.
Character | Mind | Perfection |
The regeneration of a sinner is an evidence of power in the highest sphere - moral nature; with the highest prerogative - to change nature; and operating to the highest result - not to create originally, which is great; but to create anew, which is greater.
The first real mental illumination I remember to have experienced was when I saw that the universe exists in each of its individual atoms - that is, the universe is the result of a few simple processes infinitely repeated. When a drop of water has been mathematically measured, every principle will have been used which would be called form in the measurement of the heavens. All life on the globe is sustained by digestion and assimilation; when by voluntary and traumatic action these stop death follows. The history of an individual mind is the history of the race. Know one thing in its properties and relations and you will know all things.
Action | Character | Death | History | Individual | Life | Life | Mind | Race | Universe | Will |
The strongest barrier to faith is selfishness.
Character | Faith | Selfishness |
Faith without evidence is, properly, not faith, but prejudice or presumption; faith beyond evidence is superstition, and faith contrary to evidence is either insanity or willful perversity of mind.
Character | Evidence | Faith | Insanity | Mind | Prejudice | Presumption | Superstition |
Marcus Aurelius, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus
Do every act of your life as if it were your last.
There are many seasons in a man’s life - and the more exalted and responsible his position, the more frequently do these seasons recur - when the voice of duty and the dictates of feeling are opposed to each other; and it is only the weak and the wicked who yield that obedience to the selfish impulses of the heart which is due to reason and honor.
Character | Duty | Heart | Honor | Life | Life | Man | Obedience | Position | Reason |
Rabbi Avraham of Sochotchov NULL
Life is something you measure not in years but in precious moments - and in how you value those moments. The responsibility for making such moments meaningful is yours alone. There are no definitions of failure or success except the ones you specify for yourself. You are the meaning of your own life.
Character | Failure | Life | Life | Meaning | Responsibility | Success | Failure | Value |