This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
What is so bitter and vehement as the torment of love? I mean, those who have become conscious that they have sinned against love suffer greater torment from this than from any fear of punishment. For the sorrow caused in the heart by sin against love is more poignant than any torment.
Compassion | Family | Harm | Heart | Mercy | Prayer | Receive | Sorrow | Tears |
Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
As it is not possible to cross over the great ocean without a ship, so no one can attain to love without fear. This filthy sea, which lies between us and the paradise of the heart, we may cross by the boat of repentance, whose oarsmen are those of fear. But if fear's oarsmen do not pilot the boat of repentance whereby we cross over the sea of this world to God, we shall be drowned in the sordid abyss.
Mercy |
With all this wide and beautiful creation before me, the restless soul longs to enjoy its liberty and rest beyond its bound.
Diligence | Inclination | Mercy | Prayer | Think |
Saint John of Kronstadt, fully John Il’ich Serguiev, aka Holy Father John of the Kronstadt NULL
We have icons in our houses, and venerate them, in order to show, amongst other things, that the eyes of God and of all the heavenly dwellers are constantly fixes upon us, and see not, only all our acts, but also our words, thoughts and desires.
Faith | Mercy | Miracles | Mystery | Nothing | Time | Wickedness |
These losses of the Church in the past hundred years give us reason to fear in the present misfortune that in another hundred years we may lose the Church entirely in Europe. So, keeping this fear in mind, blessed are those who cooperate in extending the Church elsewhere.
We deny the assertion made by some of our opponents when they say the American Federation of Labor is against political action. We are against the the American labor movement being made a political party machine.
Contempt | Courage | Government | Improvement | Mercy | Nothing | Order | Purpose | Purpose | Rights | Time | Will | Government | Guilty |
Shrimad Bhagavatam, or the Bhâgavata Purâna, Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, or Bhāgavata NULL
Kr?s?n?a is our most intimate master, friend, father or son and object of conjugal love. Forgetting Kr?s?n?a, we have created so many objects of questions and answers, but none of them are able to give us complete satisfaction. All things—but Kr?s?n?a—give temporary satisfaction only, so if we are to have complete satisfaction we must take to the questions and answers about Kr?s?n?a.
This morning (we living lately in the garret) I rose, put on my suit with great skirts, having not lately worn any other, clothes but them. Went to Mr. Gunning's chapel at Exeter House, where he made a very good sermon.... Dined at home in the garret, where my wife dressed the remains of a turkey, and in the doing of it she burned her hand.
Mercy |
Gregory Nazianzen, aka Saint Gregory of Nazianzus or Gregory the Theologian
Men and woman, young and old, rich and poor, the sanguine and despondent, the sick and whole, rulers and ruled, the wise and ignorant, the cowardly and courageous, the wrathful and meek, the successful and failing, do not require the same instruction and encouragement.
Absurd | Care | Day | Desire | Despise | Effort | Freedom | Good | Mercy | Money | Thought | Time | Thought |
Cyprian, aka Saint Cyprian of Carthage, fully Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus NULL
The Church is one, and as she is one, cannot be both within and without. For if she is with [the heretic] Novatian, she was not with [Pope] Cornelius. But if she was with Cornelius, who succeeded the bishop [of Rome], Fabian, by lawful ordination, and whom, beside the honor of the priesthood the Lord glorified also with martyrdom, Novatian is not in the Church; nor can he be reckoned as a bishop, who, succeeding to no one, and despising the evangelical and apostolic tradition, sprang from himself.
Gregory Nazianzen, aka Saint Gregory of Nazianzus or Gregory the Theologian
God accepts our desires as though they were a great value. He longs ardently for us to desire and love him. He accepts our petitions for benefits as though we were doing him a favor. His joy in giving is greater than ours in receiving. So let us not be apathetic in our asking, nor set too narrow bounds to our requests; nor ask for frivolous things unworthy of God’s greatness.
Counsel | God | Mercy | Need | Nothing | Right | Salvation | Will | Wisdom | Counsel | God | Think |
It is a folly to deny that which a man’s own nature witnesseth to him. The whole frame of bodies and souls bears the impress of the infinite power and wisdom of the Creator: a body framed with an admirable architecture, a soul endowed with understanding, will, judgment, memory, imagination. Man is the epitome of the world, contains in himself the substance of all natures, and the fullness of the whole universe; not only in regard of the universalness of his knowledge, whereby he comprehends the reasons of many things; but as all the perfections of the several natures of the world are gathered and united in man, for the perfection of his own, in a smaller volume. In his soul he partakes of heaven, in his body of the earth. There is the life of plants, the sense of beasts, and the intellectual nature of angels.