This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"Only those who have the patience to do simple things perfectly will acquire the skill to do difficult things easily." - Friedrich Schiller, fully Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
"Patience cannot remove, but it can always dignify and alleviate, misfortune." - Lawrence Sterne, alternatively Laurence Sterne
"Brisk talkers are usually slow thinkers. There is, indeed, no wild beast more to be dreaded than a communicative man having nothing to communicate. If you are civil to the voluble they will abuse your patience; if brusque, your character." - Jonathan Swift, pen names, M.B. Drapier, Lemuel Gulliver, Isaac Bickerstaff
"We must be knit together in this work as one man; we must entertain each other in brotherly affection; we must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must delight in each other, make others’ conditions our own, rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together; always having before our eyes our commission and community as members of the same body." - John Winthrop
"Be swift to hear, but with patience make reply." - Apocrypha NULL
"All human power is a compound of time and patience." - Honoré de Balzac
"Hope is the better half of courage. Hope has it not sustained the work, and given the fainting heart time and patience to outwit the chances and changes of life." - Honoré de Balzac
"Earnestness is the devotion of all the faculties. It is the cause of patience; gives endurance; overcome pain; strengthens weakness; braves dangers; sustains hope; make light of difficulties, and lessens the sense of weariness in overcoming them." - John Christian Bovee
"Patience is not passive; on the contrary it is active; it is concentrated strength." - Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton, fully Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, Lord Lytton
"It is not necessary for all men to be great in action. The greatest and sublimest power is simple patience." - Horace Bushnell
"An idea must not be condemned for being a little shy and incoherent; all new ideas are shy when introduced first among our old ones. We should have patience and see whether the incoherency is likely to wear off or to wear on, in which latter case the sooner we get rid of them the better." - Samuel Butler
"A new philosophy, a way of life, is not given for nothing. It has to be paid dearly for and only acquired with much patience and great effort." - Fyodor Dostoevsky, fully Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoevsky or Feodor Mikhailovich Dostoevski
"I have no patience with the stupidity of the average teacher of grammar who wastes precious years in hammering rules into children's heads. For it is not by learning rules that we acquire the powers of speaking a language, but by daily intercourse with those accustomed to express themselves with exactness ands refinement and by copious reading of the best authors." -
"If I were asked what single qualification was necessary for one who has the care of children, I should say patience - patience with their tempers, with their understandings, with their progress. It is not brilliant parts or great acquirements which are necessary for teachers, but patience to go over first principles again and again; steadily to add a little every day; never to be irritated by willful or accidental hindrance." - François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon
"Some wonder that children should be given to young mothers. But what instruction does the babe bring to the mother! She learns patience, self-control, endurance; her very arm grows strong so that she holds the dear burden longer than the father can." - Thomas Wentworth Higginson
"Five things are requisite to a good officer - ability, clean hands, despatch, patience, and impartiality." - William Penn
"There are times when God asks nothing of his children except silence, patience, and tears." - Charles Seymour Robinson
"By woe the soul to daring action steals; by woe in plaintless patience it excels." - Richard Savage
"It is an easy thing to talk of patience to the afflicted." - William Blake
"Patience is the greatest of all virtues." - Dionysius Cato
"Wonder is the attitude of reverence for the infinite values and meaning over God’s purpose and patience in it all." - George Walter Fiske
"To lose patience is to lose the battle." - Mahatma Gandhi, fully Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, aka Bapu
"Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; when you have laboriously accomplished your daily tasks, go to sleep in peace. God is awake." - Victor Hugo
"The strong, manly ones in life are those who understand the meaning of the word patience. Patience means restraining one’s inclinations. There are seven emotions: joy, anger, anxiety, love, fear, grief, and hate; and if a man does not give way to these, he can be called patient. I am not as strong as I might be, but I have long known and practiced patience." - Tokugawa Ieyasu
"There are only three things to teach: Simplicity, patience, and compassion. Simplicity in action and thoughts, will return you to the source of your being. Patience with friends and enemies alike, will give you harmony with the way things are. Compassion with yourself, will settle all the differences between you and other beings in the world." - Peter W. Jedlicka
"I have just three thins to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures. Simple in actions and in thoughts, you return to the source of being. Patient with both friends and enemies, you accord with the way things are. Compassionate toward yourself, you reconcile all beings in the world." - Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze
"You have to have a lot of patience to learn patience." - Stanislaw Lec, fully Stanisław Jerzy Lec, born Baron Stanisław Jerzy de Tusch-Letz
"If God has taken away all means of seeking remedy, there is nothing left but patience." - John Locke
"Marriage is half the tradition. [The other half is patience.]" - Muhammad, also spelled Mohammad, Mohammed or Mahomet, full name Muhammad Ibn `Abd Allāh Ibn `Abd al-Muttalib NULL
"A noble, courageous man is recognizable by the patience he shows in adversity." - Pachacutec Inca Yupanqui, sometimes referred to as Pachacuti
"Good ideas are not adopted automatically. They must be driven into practice with courageous patience." - Hyman George Rickover
"Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world." - Harriet Tubman
"A wise man does not try to hurry history. Many wars have been avoided by patience and many have been precipitated by reckless haste." - Adlai Ewing Stevenson
"Quiet and unacclaimed acts are, to me, the real margin of greatness. Greatness is not in popularity, wealth, or long life, as most people believe. Real greatness is in simplicity and supportive words. It is in firm encouragement and gentle patience. It is in finding god in the midst of the turmoil of the marketplace, and remembering His goodness during hardship. No, greatness is not always found in those whom the world calls its heroes, but in the unheard of saints who unselfishly serve their families, lend a kind ear to a friend in despair, and lovingly see the Best in those who have become too accustomed to seeing themselves as mediocre." - Alan Cohen