This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"When enthusiasm is inspired by reason; controlled by caution; sound in theory; practical in application; reflects confidence; spreads good cheer; raises morale; inspires associates; arouses loyalty, and laughs at adversity, it is beyond price." - Coleman Cox
"Enthusiasm is the element of success in everything. It is the light that leads and the strength that lifts men on and up in the great struggles of scientific pursuits and of professional labor. It robs endurance of difficulty, and makes a pleasure of duty." - William Croswell Doane
"Enthusiasm is the dynamics of your personality. Without it whatever you may possess lies dormant: and it is safe to say that nearly every man has more latent power than he ever learns to use. You may have knowledge, sound judgment, good reasoning faculties; but no one - not even yourself - will know it until you discover how to put your heart into thought and action. When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children he has left them an estate of incalculable value." -
"To waken interest and kindle enthusiasm is the sure way to teach easily and successfully." - Tyron Edwards
"Hostility without enthusiasm. [Boredom and resistance] " - Stuart Emery
"A life regardful of duty is crowned with an object, directed by a purpose, inspired by an enthusiasm, till the very humblest routine, carried out conscientiously for the sake of God is elevated into moral grandeur; and the very obscurest office, filled conscientiously at the bidding of God, becomes an imperial stage on which all the virtues play. To one who lies thus the insignificant becomes important, the unpleasant delightful, the evanescent eternal." -
"Improvement of one's economic position is helped more by cool persistence than by hot enthusiasm." - William Feather
"Enthusiasm is the electric current that keeps the engine of life going at top speed. Enthusiasm is the very propeller of progress." - B. C. Forbes, fully Bertie Charles "B.C." Forbes
"I prefer the errors of enthusiasm to the indifference of wisdom." - Anatole France, pen name of Jacques Anatole Francois Thibault
"In the whole range of human vision nothing is more attractive than to see a young man full of promise and of hope, bending all his energies in the direction of truth and duty and God, his soul pervaded with the loftiest enthusiasm, and his life consecrated to the noblest ends. To be such a young man is to rival the noblest and best of men in heroic valor." -
"Enthusiasm is the fever of reason." - Victor Hugo
"Nature has given women two painful but heavenly gifts, which distinguish them, and often raise them above human nature - compassion and enthusiasm. By compassion, they devote themselves; by enthusiasm they exalt themselves." - Alphonse de Lamartine, fully Alphonse Marie Louis de Lamartine
"Whatever you do, put romance and enthusiasm into the life of our children." - Margaret MacDonald, née Margaret Ethel Gladstone
"I look upon enthusiasm, in all other points but that of religion, to be a very necessary turn of mind; as indeed it is a vein which nature seems to have marked with more or less strength, in the tempers of most men. No matter what the object is, whether business, pleasures or the fine arts: whoever pursues them to any purpose must do con amore." -
"I believe the recipe for happiness to be just enough money to pay the monthly bills you acquire, a little surplus to give you confidence, a little too much work each day, enthusiasm for your work, a substantial share of good health, a couple of real friends, and a wife and children to share life's beauty with you." - John Morley, 1st Viscount Morely of Blackburn, Lord Morley
"There is a melancholy which accompanies all enthusiasm." - Anthony Ashley Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury
"Happiness is the sense that one matters. Happiness is an abiding enthusiasm. Happiness is single-mindedness. Happiness is whole-heartedness. Happiness is a by-product. Happiness is faith." - Sam Shoemaker, fully Samuel "Sam" Moor Shoemaker, III
"Ultimately, our purpose is to be so alive, compassionate and creative in our own lives that the whole universe quivers with excitement and enthusiasm and brings forth a new spirit, a new possibility, in our midst. Our purpose is to be both the womb and the midwife for the birthing into our world of a holy spirit filled with new potentials for life and creativity. We exist in order to quicken the creativity and spirit of our world so that new worlds, new wonders, new blessings may emerge... To truly appreciate the meaning of life, we must be prepared to let the meanings we have known stand in the presence of new insights and be transformed. We have no final answers, only the questions that lead to further discoveries, creativity and emergence. We are here that life may discover, know and express itself more abundantly for the blessing and fulfillment of all creation - past, present and potential." - David Spangler
"Taken as a whole, men will only devote their enthusiasm, their time, and their energy to matters in which their passions have a personal interest. But their personal interests, however powerful they may be, will never carry them very far or very high unless they can be made to seem noble and legitimate in their own eyes by being allied to some good cause in which the whole human race can join." - Alexis de Tocqueville, fully Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
"Let us recognize the beauty and power of true enthusiasm; and whatever we may do to enlighten ourselves and others, guard against checking or chilling a single earnest sentiment." - Henry Theodore Tuckerman
"Enthusiasm is that temper of the mind in which the imagination has got the better of the judgment." - William Warburton
"It is unfortunate, considering that enthusiasm moves the world, that so few enthusiasts can be trusted to speak the truth." - A. J. Balfour, fully Arthur James "A.J. Balfour, the Earl of Balfour
"Charisma is the ability to inspire followers with devotion and enthusiasm to a cause. It encourages disciples rather than independent persons. It is a way of investing oneself with authority over other rather than vesting others with authority over themselves." - Peter R. Breggin
"We may call it spirituality, enthusiasm, spontaneity, outlook, insight, - many names will do, - but what we mean by all of them is essentially the same. It is the power to see the element of eternal principles in which things live, - to see the way in which each fact and act is a true wave on the great ocean of infinity, to see all life full of the life of God, - and so to lose the sense of hardness and separateness in the things which happen and things we do." - Phillips Brooks
"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm." - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
"You will do foolish things, but do them with enthusiasm." - Colette, pen name of Sidonse Gabriele Colette
"When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children, he has left them an estate of incalculable value." - Thomas Edison, fully Thomas Alva Edison
"The young are looking for living models whom they can imitate and who are capable of rousing their enthusiasm and drawing them to a deeper kind of life. More than anything else, the young need sure guides to go with them on the paths of liberation that God maps out for them." - Bakola wa Ilunga
"The world’s inability to achieve a unity of thought and to end spiritual divisions is the real reason society is so deeply unhappy, so poor in ideas and enthusiasm, and so lacking in shared spiritual concepts which are its own inner joy, nobility and strength." - Barrett McGurn
"Enthusiasm is the best protection in any situation. Wholeheartedness is contagious. Give yourself, if you wish to get others." - David Seabury
"Man never rises to great truths without enthusiasm." - Vauvenargues, Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues NULL
"The 'preferred future' - an image of aspiration - [is] a powerful guidance mechanism… When people plan present actions by working backward from what is really desired, they develop energy, enthusiasm, optimism and high commitment." - Marvin Weisbord
"Enthusiasm is at the bottom of all progress. With it there is accomplishment. Without it there are only alibis." - Henry Ford
"Know what work you want to do and go after it. The young man who gets ahead must decide for himself what he wishes to do. From his own tastes, his own enthusiasm, how he must get the motive and the inspiration which are to start him on his way to a successful life." - Alexander Graham Bell
"Enthusiasm imparts itself magnetically and fuses all into one happy and harmonious unity of feeling and sentiment." - Amos Bronson Alcott
"Apathy can be overcome by enthusiasm, and enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal which takes the imagination by storm, and second, a definite intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice." - Arnold J. Toynbee, fully Arnold Joseph Toynbee
"Apathy can be overcome by enthusiasm, and enthusiasm can only be aroused by two things: first, an ideal, which takes the imagination by storm, and second, a definite intelligible plan for carrying that ideal into practice." - Arnold J. Toynbee, fully Arnold Joseph Toynbee
"Enthusiasm is the greatest asset in the world. It beats money and power and influence." - Author Unknown NULL
"Enthusiasm is the breath of genius." - Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield
"That youthful fervor, which is sometimes called enthusiasm, but which is a heat of imagination subsequently discovered to be inconsistent with the experience of actual life." - Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield