Words of Wisdom

"To see a world in a grain of sand, and a Heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour."

-William Blake (1757-1827) in his 1803 work: "Allegories of Innocence"


“I know everything. I know nothing.”

-Francois Villon


“Naked As a Worm, I Doubt in Evident, but Believe in Miracle.”

-Francois Villon


 “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

-Edmund Burke, 1729-1797, Conservative Philosopher, British statesman, parliamentary orator and political thinker


“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God .”

-(Mark 10.25)


"Self-realization means that we have been consciously connected with our source of being."

-Unknown Source


 “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at will change.”

-Max Planck


"Courage was mine, and I had mystery; Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery."

-Wilfred Owen


"I was that which others cared not to be. I went where others feared to go and did what others failed to do. I asked nothing from those that gave nothing."

-Anonymous War Poet


Predicting the Future?

In 1962, Emmet John Hughes published a memoir of the Eisenhower presidency called, “The Ordeal of Power”. Hughes, a prominent journalist who had served Eisenhower as a speechwriter, admired the president as a person and for his role as the commanding general in Europe during World War II. Still, the portrait of Eisenhower was unflattering because it depicted a leader ill suited for the White House. Eisenhower, Hughes believed, never mastered the political skills needed to create a vigorous presidency.

Even now Hughes’s elegantly written book is a wonderful read. However, historians generally dissent from its central conclusion. They increasingly think that Eisenhower was more politically deft than people believed and that, he conducted a successful presidency. In a recent ranking by historians conducted by C-SPAN, Eisenhower is listed ninth, ahead of Lyndon Johnson (10), Ronald Reagan (11), John Adams (16), Bill Clinton (21), and Jimmy Carter (22).

In sum, one has to skeptical in instant analysis, scorekeeping to determine the character and the significance of a presidency or a scientific finding, or forecasting the future. Consider Truman, in 1948, almost no one expected him to win. A month before the vote, Newsweek polled 50 top political writers. The verdict was unanimous: 50 to 0 against Truman. The Chicago Tribune labeled him “an incompetent.” The Baltimore Sun professed affection for him, but said his election “would be a tragedy for the country and the world.” Well, Truman now ranks fifth on the C-SPAN historians’ list behind Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, Washington, and Theodore Roosevelt.


What Crisis?

One morning long ago, I fetched The Washington Post from the porch and discovered that I had slept through an earthquake. The paper was still full of stories about the quake, the damage, the aftershock, and what people were saying and doing. This, in a nutshell, is my feeling about the “crisis” caused by gay marriage. Where is it?

Almost everywhere, says the President of the United States , who proposes a constitutional amendment to rectify matters. In his official statement, President Bush notes that gays and lesbians have been married in San Francisco and that a county in New Mexico has issued marriage licenses to them. As with weapons of mass destruction, there is a lot less here than allegedly meet the eyes. That and this statement are just plain silly. It reminds me of a former President, Harry S. Truman, who thought he could appease the forces of a nascent McCarthyism by instituting a government royalty program. All he did, though, was encourage anti-communist zealots in their abuse of civil liberties. Truman played politics with fanatics and it did not work. Bush is attempting something similar. He is securing his conservative base before the general election. He is using a political opportunity to become President again rather than be right. 

-Richard Cohen, The Washington Post, February 27, 2004


“I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House-with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”

-President John F. Kennedy; The 1962 White House Dinner Honoring Nobel Laureates:


"If you think that something small cannot make a difference - try going to sleep with a mosquito in the room." -Unknown Source 


"Give me a firm place to stand, and I will move the earth."

-Archimedes


"The value of an idea lies in the using of it."

-Thomas Edison


Galileo Galilei

One of the world's greatest leaders never led a revolution, commanded an army, or ruled a country.

Galileo Galilei never had to see a battle field or hold a political office to distinguish himself as a leader. It was his depth of knowledge and years of experience and commitment in the field of modern science that made him a leading historical figure. As scientists, we must have a long-standing commitment to the exploration and development of scientific ideas.


True Knowledge

"To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge."

-Thoreau, Walden (quoting Confucius)


"If a man can write a better book, preach a better sermon, or make a better mouse trap, than his neighbor, though he builds his house in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door."

-Emerson, 1871


"In the first place, he always said what he thought; in the second place, he was full of all sorts of ways of saying it; and, in the third place, he said only what he had to say."

-Hilaire Belloc on Hans Christian Andersen:


What is Life?

Life is a challenge . . . meet it

Life is a gift . . . accept it.

Life is an adventure . . . dare it.

Life is a sorrow . . . overcome it.

Life is a tragedy . . . face it.

Life is a duty . . . perform it.

Life is a game . . . play it.

Life is a mystery . . . unfold it.

Life is a song . . . sing it.

Life is an opportunity . . . take it.

Life is a journey . . . complete it.

Life is a promise . . . fulfill it.

Life is a beauty . . . praise it.

Life is a struggle . . . fight it.

Life is a goal . . . achieve it.

Life is a puzzle . . . solve it.


“Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.”

- Fran Lebowitz , US writer and humorist


A Child

A child is innocence meeting the world

With a trusting out-stretched hand,

Curiosity discovering the world

Unhurried, unplanned

Honestly laying bare the world's

True joys and hidden flaws

Excitement never allowing the world to stop,

but briefly pause.

A child is Laughter, conquering the world

With an open, smiling face.

A child is Love, uplifting the world

To happier, higher places.

-Kay Andrew


October Historical Events in Chemistry

By Leopold May

Oct. 1,1940      

Air Products and Chernicals, Inc. was incorporated.

Oct 2,1791       

Birthday of Alexis T. Petit, who studied specific heats of solids and discovered product of specific heat and atomic weight is constant for all elements (DuLong-Petit Law).

Oct. 4, 1957     

The first artificial earth satellite, Sputnik I, launched by USSR .

Oct. 5,1861      

The Chemical Society of Union College, the precursor of the American Chemical Society, was founded on this day.

Oct. 9, 1852     

Emil H. Fischer was born on this day. He synthesized sugars, I caffeine, uric acid, and many other chernicals for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1902. He introduced projection formulas for spatial arrangements of group around chiral carbon atoms, which are known as Fischer projections.

Oct. 10,1731    

Birthday of Henry Cavendish, who discovered hydrogen in 1766, synthesized water, and was an independent discoverer of nitrogen.

Oct 11, 1946    

Birthday of Akbar Montaser, whose research team developed the most advanced aerosol diagnostic techniques for measuring aerosol properties from the site of generation to the final destination in the high temperature plasmas.

Oct. 21, 1833   

Alfred Nobel the inventor of dynamite and the creator of the Nobel Prizes, was born on this day.

Oct. 24,1877    

Roger Clark Wells was born on this day. He did research on sodium compounds and chemical analyses of radioactive minerals and was Chief Chemist of U. S. Geological Survey.

Oct. 29,1827    

Birthday of Marcellin P. E. Berthelot, a founder of thermo-chemistry, and showed that nitrogen was fixed by electric discharges and bacteria. He also synthesized alcohol, formic acid, methane and acetylene.

Oct. 30,1895

Gerhard Domagk was born on this day. He discovered the properties of prontosil, range-red dye containing sulfanilamide. He refused the Nobel Prize in 1939 on instructions from German government. He also reported that isoniazid had antitubercular properties, 1952, which opened the age of chemotherapy.

Except for one, these are excerpts from "Milestones in Chemistry", a calendar published by the American Chemical Society and the Beckman Center for the History of Chemistry. Research for the calendar and its text are by Dr. Leopold May of Catholic University . Copies of "Milestones in Chemistry" are available from the National Chemistry Week Office, The American Chemical Society, 1155 16th Street, NW , Washington , DC 20036


John Keats. 1795–1821


625. Ode on a Grecian Urn

... 'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.' 50

© 2007 Montaser Research Group. The George Washington University.