The experience gathered from books, though often valuable, is but the nature of learning; whereas the experience gained from actual life is one of the nature of wisdom.
SAMUEL SMILESNo laws, however stringent, can make the idle industrious, the thriftless provident, or the drunken sober.
More Samuel Smiles Quotes
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Politeness goes far, yet costs nothing.
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The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at once.
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Like men, nations are purified and strengthened by trials.
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No laws, however stringent, can make the idle industrious, the thriftless provident, or the drunken sober. Such reforms can only be effected by means of individual action, economy and self-denial; by better habits, rather than by greater rights.
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The great lesson of biography is to show what man can be and do at his best. A noble life put fairly on record acts like an inspiration to others.
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Progress however, of the best kind, is comparatively slow. Great results cannot be achieved at once; and we must be satisfied to advance in life as we walk, step by step.
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Childhood is like a mirror, which reflects in after life the images first presented to it.
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Man cannot aspire if he looked down; if he rise, he must look up.
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Men must necessarily be the active agents of their own well-being and well-doing they themselves must in the very nature of things be their own best helpers.
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Luck whines; labor whistles.
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The spirit of self-help is the root of all genuine growth in the individual.
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For want of self-restraint many men are engaged all their lives in fighting with difficulties of their own making.
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It will generally be found that men who are constantly lamenting their ill luck are only reaping the consequences of their own neglect, mismanagement, and improvidence, or want of application.
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Great men stamp their mind upon their age and nation.
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The cheapest of all things is kindness, its exercise requiring the least possible trouble and self-sacrifice. Win hearts, said Burleigh to Queen Elizabeth, and you have all men’s hearts and purses.
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Wisdom and understanding can only become the possession of individual men by travelling the old road of observation, attention, perseverance, and industry.
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The brave man is an inspiration to the weak, and compels them, as it were, to follow him.
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Practical wisdom is only to be learned in the school of experience. Precepts and instruction are useful so far as they go, but, without the discipline of real life, they remain of the nature of theory only.
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Labor is still, and ever will be, the inevitable price set upon everything which is valuable.
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No laws, however stringent, can make the idle industrious, the thriftless provident, or the drunken sober.
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Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
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Stothard learned the art of combining colors by closely studying butterflies wings; he would often say that no one knew what he owed to these tiny insects. A burnt stick and a barn door served Wilkie in lieu of pencil and canvas.
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It is the close observation of little things which is the secret of success in business, in art, in science, and in every pursuit of life.
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If we opened our minds to enjoyment, we might find tranquil pleasures spread about us on every side. We might live with the angels that visit us on every sunbeam, and sit with the fairies who wait on every flower.
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Necessity, oftener than facility, has been the mother of invention; and the most prolific school of all has been the school of difficulty.
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The apprenticeship of difficulty is one which the greatest of men have had to serve.
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