This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
He who wishes to exert a useful influence must be careful to insult nothing. Let him not be troubled by what seems absurd, but concentrate his energies to the creation of what is good. He must not demolish, but build. He must raise temples where mankind may come and partake of the purest pleasure.
Absurd | Good | Influence | Insult | Mankind | Nothing | Pleasure | Wisdom | Wishes | Insult |
Every man wishes to pursue his occupation and to enjoy the fruits of his labors and the produce of his property in peace and safety, and with the least possible expense. When these things are accomplished, all the objects for which government ought to be established are answered.
Government | Man | Occupation | Peace | Property | Wisdom | Wishes | Government |
Juan Manuel, Prince of Villena
He who praises you for what you lack wishes to take from you what you have.
Manilius, fully Marcus Manilius NULL
Every one is poorer in proportion as he has more wants, and counts not what he has, but wishes only for what he has not.
Niccolò Machiavelli, formally Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
Men are more ready to offend one who desires to be beloved than one who wishes to be feared.
Reading affords the opportunity to everyone - the poor, the rich, the humble, the great - to spend as many hours as he wishes in the company of the noblest men and women that the world has ever known.
Union does everything when it is perfect; it satisfies desires, it simplifies needs, it foresees the wishes of the imagination; it is an aisle always open, and becomes a constant fortune.
Fortune | Imagination | Wisdom | Wishes |
Alexis de Tocqueville, fully Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
When a child begins to move in the midst of the objects that surround him, he is instinctively led to appropriate to himself everything that he can lay his hands upon; he has no notion of the property of others; but as he gradually learns the value of things and begins to perceive that he may in his turn be despoiled, he becomes more circumspect, and he ends by respecting those rights in others which he wishes to have respected in himself. The principle which the child derives from the possession of his toys is taught to the man by the objects which he may call his own.
Ends | Man | Property | Rights | Wisdom | Wishes | Child | Value |
Johann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann
One ought to love society, if he wishes to enjoy solitude. It is a social nature that solitude works upon with the most various power. If one is misanthropic, and betakes himself to loneliness that he may get away from hateful things, solitude is a silent emptiness to him.
Loneliness | Love | Nature | Power | Society | Solitude | Wisdom | Wishes |
Johann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann
We protract the career of time by employment, we lengthen the duration of our lives by wise thoughts and useful actions. Life to him who wishes not to have lived in vain is thought and action.
Action | Life | Life | Thought | Time | Wisdom | Wise | Wishes | Thought |
Winston Churchill, fully Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill
When asked what are the desirable qualifications for any young person who wishes to become a politician, Churchill replied: It is the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen.