Trust a philosopher to come up with a good recipe for wisdom. Writer George Santayana (1863-1952) was born on this day in Madrid, Spain and moved to Boston in 1872.

"An ideal cannot wait for its realization to prove its validity," he once said.

Santayana attended Harvard, then taught there, influencing such famous students as writers T.S. Eliot and Gertrude Stein.

"Knowledge of what is possible is the beginning of happiness," he wrote.

To learn more about life's possibilities, in 1912 Santayana took advantage of a small inheritance, retired, and moved to Oxford, then Paris, then Rome.

"It is wisdom to believe the heart," he said.

He celebrated the creative imagination and wrote with versatility and distinction about America and Europe. His credits include over 20 volumes of philosophy, poetry, criticism, a best-selling novel, The Last Puritan (1935), and a three-volume autobiography.

"Those who do not remember the past," he said wisely, "are condemned to repeat it."

Wisdom comes with a smile.