This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"Perhaps one of the reasons for this silence is that you have to know how to read music. For instance, the scientific article may say, 'The radioactive phosphorus content of the cerebrum of the rat decreases to one- half in a period of two weeks.' Now what does that mean?" - Richard Feynman, fully Richard Phillips Feynman
"A slumberous silence of abundant light, of the full sum" - Richard Jefferies, fully John Richard Jefferies
"in accidents blindness chance conviction cosmology day death despair doubt feeling force harmony heart intelligence listening music Peace purpose reason Silence universe" - Richard E. Byrd, fully Richard Evelyn Byrd, Jr.
"Movement and silence are two states. The independent master can use movement and silence freely." - Rinzai, aka Lin- Chi Yi-Sen, Lin-chi I-hsuan, Rinzai Gigen, Venerable Master Lin Chi NULL
"There shall never be one lost good! What was shall live as before; The evil is null, is nought, is silence implying sound; What was good shall be good, with, for evil, so much good more; On the earth the broken arcs; in the heaven a perfect round." - Robert Browning
"Most part of a lover's life is full of agony, anxiety, fear and grief, complaints, sighs, suspicions, and cares (heigh-ho my heart is woe), full of silence and irksome solitariness" - Robert Burton
"There's gold, and it's haunting and haunting; It's luring me on as of old; Yet it isn't the gold that I'm wanting so much as just finding the gold. It's the forests where silence has lease; It's the beauty that thrills me with wonder, It's the stillness that fills me with peace." - Robert Service, fully Robert William Service
"LOVE'S SERVILE LOT - LOVE, mistress is of many minds, Yet few know whom they serve ; They reckon least how little Love Their service doth deserve. The will she robbeth from the wit, The sense from reason's lore ; She is delightful in the rind, Corrupted in the core. She shroudeth vice in virtue's veil, Pretending good in ill ; She offereth joy, affordeth grief, A kiss where she doth kill. A honey-shower rains from her lips, Sweet lights shine in her face ; She hath the blush of virgin mind, The mind of viper's race. She makes thee seek, yet fear to find To find, but not enjoy : In many frowns some gliding smiles She yields to more annoy. She woos thee to come near her fire, Yet doth she draw it from thee ; Far off she makes thy heart to fry, And yet to freeze within thee. She letteth fall some luring baits For fools to gather up ; Too sweet, too sour, to every taste She tempereth her cup. Soft souls she binds in tender twist, Small flies in spinner's web ; She sets afloat some luring streams, But makes them soon to ebb. Her watery eyes have burning force ; Her floods and flames conspire : Tears kindle sparks, sobs fuel are, And sighs do blow her fire. May never was the month of love, For May is full of flowers ; But rather April, wet by kind, For love is full of showers. Like tyrant, cruel wounds she gives, Like surgeon, salve she lends ; But salve and sore have equal force, For death is both their ends. With soothing words enthralled souls She chains in servile bands ; Her eye in silence hath a speech Which eye best understands. Her little sweet hath many sours, Short hap immortal harms ; Her loving looks are murd'ring darts, Her song bewitching charms. Like winter rose and summer ice, Her joys are still untimely ; Before her Hope, behind Remorse : Fair first, in fine unseemly. Moods, passions, fancy's jealous fits Attend upon her train : She yieldeth rest without repose, And heaven in hellish pain. Her house is Sloth, her door Deceit, And slippery Hope her stairs ; Unbashful Boldness bids her guests, And every vice repairs. Her diet is of such delights As please till they be past ; But then the poison kills the heart That did entice the taste. Her sleep in sin doth end in wrath, Remorse rings her awake ; Death calls her up, Shame drives her out, Despairs her upshot make. Plough not the seas, sow not the sands, Leave off your idle pain ; Seek other mistress for your minds, Love's service is in vain." - Robert Southwell, also Saint Robert Southwell
"In silence the heart raves. It utters words Meaningless, that never had A meaning. I was ten, skinny, red-headed, Freckled. In a big black Buick, Driven by a big grown boy, with a necktie, she sat In front of the drugstore, sipping something Through a straw. There is nothing like Beauty. It stops your heart.It Thickens your blood. It stops your breath. It Makes you feel dirty. You need a hot bath. I leaned against a telephone pole, and watched. I thought I would die if she saw me. " - Robert Penn Warren
"After the Dinner Party - You two sit at the table late, each, now and then, Twirling a near-empty wine glass to watch the last red Liquid blimb up the crystalline spin to the last moment when Centrifugality fails: with nothing now said. What is left to say when the last logs sag and wink? The dark outside is streaked with the casual snowflake Of winter’s demise, all guests long gone home, and you think Of others who never again can come to partake Of food, wine, laughter, and philosophy— Though tonight one guest has quoted a killing phrase we owe To a lost one whose grin, in eternal atrophy, Now in dark celebrates some last unworded jest none can know. Now a chair scrapes, sudden, on tiles, and one of you Moves soundless, as in hypnotic certainty, The length of table. Stands there a moment or two, Then sits, reaches out a hand, open and empty. How long it seems till a hand finds that hand there laid, While ash, still glowing, crumbles, and silence is such That the crumbling of ash is audible. Now naught’s left unsaid Of the old heart-concerns, the last, tonight, which Had been of the absent children, whose bright gaze Over-arches the future’s horizon, in the mist of your prayers, The last log is black, while ash beneath displays No last glow. You snuff candles. Soon the old stairs Will creak with your grave and synchronized tread as each mounts To a briefness of light, then true weight of darkness, and then That heart-dimness in which neither joy nor sorrow counts. Even so, one hand gropes out for another, again." - Robert Penn Warren
"Movement and silence are two states. The independent master can use movement and silence freely." - Rinzai, aka Lin- Chi Yi-Sen, Lin-chi I-hsuan, Rinzai Gigen, Venerable Master Lin Chi NULL
"Strayed in mid-youth, rouse up, nor sleep, for lo! The days of youth like clouds of smoke will pass. Ere evening falls, thou shalt be withered grass, Though morning saw thee like a lily blow. Why waste on ancestors a heated breath, Or note which progeny was Abraham’s? Whether his food be herbs or Bashan rams, Man, wretched wight, is on his way to death." - Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
"O God, my countenance falleth, When I remember all wherein I have provoked Thee. For all the good which Thou hast bestowed on me I have requited Thee with evil. For Thou hast created me not from necessity, but from grace, And not by compulsion of circumstance But by favour and love. And before I was, With Thy mercies didst Thou precede me, And breathe into me a spirit and call me into being, And after I came forth into the light of the world Thou didst not forsake me, But like a tender father didst Thou watch over my growing up, And as a nurse fostereth a suckling didst Thou foster me. Upon the breasts of my mother Thou madest me rest trustfully, And with Thy delight didst satisfy me. And when I essayed my feet, Thou didst strengthen my standing And didst take me in Thine arms and teach me to walk. And wisdom and discipline didst Thou impart to me, And from all trouble and distress didst Thou relieve me, And at the time of the passing away of Thy wrath In the shadow of Thy hand didst Thou hide me, And from how many sorrows concealed from mine eyes didst Thou deliver me! For before the hardship came Thou didst prepare the remedy for my distress all unbeknown to me, And when from some injury I was unguarded, Thou didst guard me, And when I came within the fangs of lions Thou didst break the teeth of the whelps and deliver me thence, And when evil and constant distress anguished me, Thou hast freely healed me, And when Thy dreadful judgment came upon the world, Thou didst deliver me from the sword And didst save me from the pestilence, And in famine didst feed me, And with plenty sustain me. And when I provoked Thee, Thou didst chastise me as a father chastiseth his son, And when I called out from the depths of my sorrow, My soul was precious in Thy sight, Nor didst Thou send me empty away. But all this didst Thou yet exceed and add to When Thou gavest me a perfect faith To believe that Thou art the God of Truth And that Thy Law is true and Thy prophets are true. For Thou hast not set my portion with the rebels and those who rise up against Thee And the foolish multitude that blaspheme Thy name; Who make mock of Thy law, And contend with Thy servants, And give the lie to Thy prophets, Making a show of innocence But with cunning below, Exhibiting a pure and stainless soul, While underneath lurketh the bright leprous spot: Like to a vessel full of shameful things, Washed on the outside with the waters of deceit, And defiling all that is within." - Salomon ibn Gabirol, aka Solomon ben Judah or Avicebron
"Nil admirari is the motto which men of the world always affect. They think it vulgar to wonder, or be enthusiastic. They have so much corruption and so much charlatanism that they think the credit of all high qualities must be delusive." - Samuel Egerton Brydges
"The long ages of infancy and childhood, through which the human race has to pass, have receded into the background. Humanity is now experiencing the commotions invariably associated with the most turbulent stage of its evolution, the stage of adolescence, when the impetuosity of youth and its vehemence reach their climax, and must gradually be superseded by the calmness, the wisdom, and the maturity that characterize the stage of adulthood. Mankind, in these fateful years... is... being simultaneously called upon to give account of its past actions, and is being purged and prepared for its future mission. It can neither escape the responsibilities of the past, nor shirk those of the future. Then will a world civilization be born, flourish, and perpetuate itself, a civilization with a fullness of life such as the world has never seen nor can as yet conceive... Then will the promise enshrined in all the books of God be redeemed, and all the prophecies uttered by the prophets of old come to pass, and the vision of seers and poets be realized. Then will the planet, galvanized through the universal belief of its dwellers in one God, and their allegiance to one common revelation... be acclaimed as the earthly heaven, capable of fulfilling that ineffable destiny fixed for it from time immemorial by the love and wisdom of its Creator." - Shoghí Effendi, fully Shoghí Effendí Rabbání
"Rose-Morals - I. -- Red. Would that my songs might be What roses make by day and night -- Distillments of my clod of misery Into delight. Soul, could'st thou bare thy breast As yon red rose, and dare the day, All clean, and large, and calm with velvet rest? Say yea -- say yea! Ah, dear my Rose, good-bye; The wind is up; so; drift away. That songs from me as leaves from thee may fly, I strive, I pray. II. -- White. Soul, get thee to the heart Of yonder tuberose: hide thee there -- There breathe the meditations of thine art Suffused with prayer. Of spirit grave yet light, How fervent fragrances uprise Pure-born from these most rich and yet most white Virginities! Mulched with unsavory death, Grow, Soul! unto such white estate, That virginal-prayerful art shall be thy breath, Thy work, thy fate." - Sidney Lanier
"A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"In the house of lovers, the music never stops, the walls are made of songs and the floor dances." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"In the slaughterhouse of love, they kill only the best, none of the weak or deformed. Don't run away from this dying. Whoever's not killed for love is dead meat." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"Let the beauty of what you love be what you do. There are a thousand ways to kneel and kiss the earth." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"There is a way of breathing that's a shame and a suffocation and there's another way of expiring, a love breath, that lets you open infinitely." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"We should ask God to help us toward manners. Inner gifts do not find their way to creatures without just respect." - Rumi, fully Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rumi NULL
"Things don’t ‘fall’ normally around small cosmic bodies. The local gravity is so low that any lateral velocity has an exaggerated effect. The behavior of objects around asteroids is counter-intuitive, if not absolutely chaotic." - Russell Schweikart, fully Russell Louis "Rusty" Schweickart aka Schweikart
"Work is afraid of a skilled worker." - Russian Proverbs
"I hope you will be benefitted by your churchgoing. Where the habit does not Christianize, it generally civilizes. That is reason enough for supporting churches, if there were no higher." - Rutherford B. Hayes, fully Rutherford Birchard Hayes
"Why is it better to love than to be loved? It is surer." - Sacha Guitry, fully Alexandre-Pierre Georges "Sacha" Guitry
"And He wishes all of us to be saved through Him and receive Him with our heart pure and our body chaste." - Saint Francis of Assisi, born Giovanni Francesco di Bernardone NULL
"Any kind of thought or meditation or pleasure would impede and disturb the soul and would introduce noise into the deep silence which the soul should observe in order to hear the deep and delicate voice in which God speaks to the heart in this secret place. When the soul is led into silence, it must forget even the practice of loving advertence… it must practice that advertence only when it is not conscious of being brought into solitude or interior rest or forgetfulness. Pure contemplation consists in receiving. The soul approaches God more nearly by not understanding than by understanding. Faith is darkness to the understanding. God brought them to this solitude and emptiness of their faculties and operations that He may speak to their hearts. God is leading you through the state of solitude and recollection and withdrawing you from your labors of sense. Return not to sense again. Lay aside your operations for they will now be a great obstacle and hindrance to you, since God is granting you the grace of Himself working within you. God is bearing the soul in His arms… and thus, although it is making progress at the rate willed by God Himself, it is not conscious of such movement. Three kinds of love: 1. the soul now loves God, not through itself but through Himself. 2. the soul is absorbed in the love of God and God surrenders Himself to the soul with great vehemence. 3. the soul love Him for Who He is." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
"As God sets the soul in this dark night… He allows it not to find attraction or sweetness in anything whatsoever. God transfers to the spirit the good things and the strength of the senses… if it is not immediately conscious of spiritual sweetness and delight, but only of aridity and lack of sweetness, the reason for this is the strangeness of the exchange. #6. If those souls to whom this comes to pass knew how to be quiet at this time… then they would delicately experience this inward refreshment in that ease and freedom from care… it is like the air which, if one would close one’s hand upon it, escapes. In this state of contemplation… it is God Who is now working in the soul. He binds its interior faculties, and allows it not to cling to the understanding, nor to have delight in the will, nor to reason with the memory. God communicates… by pure spirit. From this time forward imagination and fancy can find no support in any meditation." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
"If the memory is annihilated, the devil is powerless, and it liberates us from a lot of sorrow, affliction and sadness." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
"You are a hidden God. Neither is the sublime communication nor the sensible awareness of His nearness a sure testimony of His gracious presence, nor is dryness and a lack of these a reflection of His absence. A person who wants to find Him should leave all things through affection and will, enter within himself in deepest recollection, and regard things as though they were nonexistence. God is hidden in the soul. You yourself are His dwelling and His secret chamber and hiding place. God is never absent. In order to find Him you should forget all your possessions and all creatures and hide in the interior, secret chamber of your spirit. And there, closing the door behind you, you should pray to your Father in secret. Remaining hidden with Him, you will experience Him in hiding, and love and enjoy Him in hiding. God is the substance and concept of faith, and faith is the secret and the mystery. Faith and love are like the blind man’s guides. They will lead you along a path unknown to you, to the place where God is hidden. Pay no attention to anything which your faculties can grasp. You should never desire satisfaction in what you understand about God, but in what you do not understand about Him Never stop with loving and delighting in your understanding and experience of God, but love and delight in what is neither understandable nor perceptible of Him. Spiritual wounds of love are very delightful and desirable. The soul would desire to be ever dying a thousand deaths from the thrusts of the lance, for they make her go out of herself and enter into God. The wounded soul, strengthened from the fire caused by the wound, went out after her Beloved Who wounded her, calling for Him, that He might heal her. One goes out from oneself through self-forgetfulness." - Saint John of the Cross, born Juan de Yepes Álvarez NULL
"In this matter [of the incarnation] my ignorance far surpasses my knowledge; but this one thing I know well, that I am ignorant of things which I cannot understand." - Saint Ambrose, born Aurelius Ambrosius NULL
"In love did God bring the world into existence; in love is God going to bring it to that wondrous transformed state, and in love will the world be swallowed up in the great mystery of the one who has performed all these things; in love will the whole course of the governance of creation be finally comprised." - Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
"Mercy and justice (just judgment) in one soul is like a man who worships God and the idols in one house. Mercy is opposed to justice. Justice is the equality of the even scale, for it gives to each as he deserves; and when it makes recompense, it does not incline to one side or show respect of persons. Mercy, on the other hand, is a sorrow and pity stirred up by goodness, and it compassionately inclines a man in the direction of all; it[, mercy,] does not requite [or give equal retribution, an eye for an eye, to] a man who is deserving of evil, and to him who is deserving of good it gives a double portion." - Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
"Worldly glory is a reef in the sea covered by water; for as this lies unknown to the sailor until his vessel strikes it, cracks up, is filled with water and sinks, so vain glory does to a man until it drowns and destroys him." - Saint Isaac of Nineveh, also Isaac the Syrian, Isaac of Qatar and Isaac Syrus NULL
"This is the cause of all evils, the not knowing the Scriptures. We go into battle without arms, and how are we to come off safe?" - John Chrysostom, fully Saint John Chrysostom
"Art is the conveyance of spirit by means of matter." - Salvador de Madariaga, fully Salvador de Madariaga y Rojo
"You never find people laboring to convince you that you may live very happily upon a plentiful income." - Samuel Johnson, aka Doctor Johnson
"In seeking wisdom thou art wise; in imagining that thou hast attained it, thou art a fool." - Simeon ben Azai, sometimes Ben Azai
"There is no denying that Hitler and Stalin are alive today... they are waiting for us to forget, because this is what makes possible the resurrection of these two monsters." - Simon Wiesenthal
"We know that we are not collectively guilty, so how can we accuse any other nation, no matter what some of its people have done, of being collectively guilty?" - Simon Wiesenthal
"A science which does not bring us nearer to God is worthless." - Simone Weil
"The accomplished hypocrite does not exercise his skill upon every possible occasion for the sake of acquiring facility in the use of his instruments. In all unimportant matters, who is more just, more upright, more candid, more honorable?" - Arthur Helps, fully Sir Arthur Helps
"The man who seeks a quid pro quo from God builds on uncertainty, whereas the man who considers himself a debtor will receive sudden and unexpected riches." - John Climacus, fully Saint John Climacus, aka John of the Ladder, John Scholasticus and John Sinaites
"The whole world is a man's birthplace." - Statius, fully Publius Papinius Statius NULL
"All lovers live by longing, and endure: summon a vision and declare it pure." - Theodore Roethke
"Be not anxious about thy provision for old age, for by all appearance thou wilt never see it. It is more than probable thou wilt be sooner at thy journey's end. The body is weak; it is even stepping down to salute corruption as its mother, ere it has well entered the hall of the world: thy tabernacle pins seem to be drawing out by little and little already. Courage then, O my soul; ere long the devil, and the world, and the flesh shall be bruised underthy feet; and thou shalt be received into eternal mansions. But though the Lord should lengthen out thy days to old age, he that brought thee into life will not forsake thee then either. If he give thee life, he will give thee meat. Keep a loose hold of the world then; contemn it if thou wouldst be a fisher of men.." - Thomas Boston
"This was not the very finest quality of weaving with gold thread, of the kind that was being produced for the leading courts of the day by the Brussels workshops. Rather, it reflects the sort of medium-quality tapestries that the Florence workshops were producing at this time for use in the Medici palaces. Still, the pride they must have felt, knowing this would be destined to go to Como. Tapestry was such an important part of the theatrical presentation of the day. It was the whole stage set against which the formal side of life was acted out." - Thomas Campbell