This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Mary Kay Ash, fully Mary Kathlyn Wagner Ash
Courage is confidence. No matter how dark night may be, courage always finds the light and the promise of a distant star.
Mary Kay Ash, fully Mary Kathlyn Wagner Ash
Did you ever notice that when you light a candle from one already illuminated, the original candle does not lose any of its brilliance! And in doing so, the light from the original candle can light up the entire room, magnifying itself over and over again by lighting other candles. ...you can illuminate the lives of others.
Light |
May Sarton, pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton
Here life goes on, even and monotonous on the surface, full of lightning, of summits and of despair, in its depths. We have now arrived at a stage in life so rich in new perceptions that cannot be transmitted to those at another stage - one feels at the same time full of so much gentleness and so much despair - the enigma of this life grows, grows, drowns one and crushes one, then all of a sudden in a supreme moment of light one becomes aware of the sacred.
Ere you lie down to sleep in the night, sit still awhile, and nurse again to life your gentler self. Forget the restless, noisy spirit of the day, and encourage to speech the soft voices within you that timidly whisper of the peace of the quiet night; and occasionally look out at the quiet stars. The night will soothe you like a tender mother, folding you against her soft bosom, and hiding you from the harm of the world. Though denied and rejected by men in the light of day, the night will not reject you and in the still of her soft shadows you are free. After the day's struggle there is no freedom like unfettered thoughts, no sound like the music of silence. And though behind you lies a road of dust and heat and discouragement, and before you the challenge and uncertainty of untried paths, in this brief hour you are master of all highways, and the universe nestles in your soul.
Challenge | Freedom | Harm | Life | Life | Light | Men | Music | Peace | Quiet | Sound | Speech | Spirit | Struggle | Uncertainty | Universe | Will |
May Sarton, pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton
Human relations just are not fixed in their orbits like the planets - they're more like galaxies, changing all the time, exploding into light for years, then dying away.
Light |
Max Planck, fully Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck
Thus, the photons which constitute a ray of light behave like intelligent human beings: out of all possible curves they always select the one which will take them most quickly to their goal.
Max Planck, fully Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck
The Theory of Relativity confers an absolute meaning on a magnitude which in classical theory has only a relative significance: the velocity of light. The velocity of light is to the Theory of Relativity as the elementary quantum of action is to the Quantum Theory: it is its absolute core.
Maya Angelou, born Marguerite Annie Johnson
Touched by an Angel. We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. Love arrives and in its train come ecstasies old memories of pleasure ancient histories of pain. Yet if we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls. We are weaned from our timidity In the flush of love's light we dare be brave And suddenly we see that love costs all we are and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.
Courage | Fear | Light | Loneliness | Love | Pleasure | Will |
May Sarton, pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton
I always forget how important the empty days are, how important it may be sometimes not to expect to produce anything, even a few lines in a journal. A day when one has not pushed oneself to the limit seems a damaged damaging day, a sinful day. Not so! The most valuable thing one can do for the psyche, occasionally, is to let it rest, wander, live in the changing light of a room.
Maya Angelou, born Marguerite Annie Johnson
Nothing can dim the light which shines from within.
Light |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
Grace is from God, and works in the depth of the soul whose powers it employs. It is a light which issues forth to do service under the guidance of the Spirit. The Divine Light permeates the soul, and lifts it above the turmoil of temporal things to rest in God. The soul cannot progress except with the light which God has given it as a nuptial gift; love works the likeness of God into the soul. The peace, freedom and blessedness of all souls consist in their abiding in God's will. Towards this union with God for which it is created the soul strives perpetually.
Blessedness | Freedom | God | Guidance | Light | Love | Progress | Rest | Service | Soul | Turmoil | Guidance | God |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
The inner work is first of all the work of God's grace in the depth of the soul which subsequently distributes itself among the faculties of the soul, in that of Reason appearing as Belief, in that of Will as Love, and in that of Desire as Hope. When the Divine Light penetrates the soul, it is united with God as light with light. This is the light of faith. Faith bears the soul to heights unreachable by her natural senses and faculties.
Desire | Faith | God | Grace | Light | Reason | Soul | Will | Work | God |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
Truly, it is in darkness that one finds the light, so when we are in sorrow, then this light is nearest of all to us
We don't want to feel less when we have finished a book; we want to feel that new possibilities of being have been opened to us. We don't want to close a book with a sense that life is totally unfair and that there is no light in the darkness; we want to feel that we have been given illumination.
It is better to light candles than to curse the darkness. It is better to plant seeds than to accuse the earth. The world needs all of our power and love and energy, and each of us has something that we can give. The trick is to find it and use it, to find it and give it away. So there will always be more. We can be lights for each other, and through each other's illumination we will see the way. Each of us is a seed, a silent promise, and it is always spring.
I would like to travel light on this journey of life, to get rid of the encumbrances I acquire each day.
The world of science lives fairly comfortably with paradox. We know that light is a wave, and also that light is a particle. The discoveries made in the infinitely small world of particle physics indicate randomness and chance, and I do not find it any more difficult to live with the paradox of a universe of randomness and chance and a universe of pattern and purpose than I do with light as a wave and light as a particle. Living with contradiction is nothing new to the human being.
Chance | Contradiction | Light | Nothing | Paradox | Purpose | Purpose | Science | Universe | World |