A fig-tree looking on a fig-tree becometh fruitful,” says the Arabian proverb. And so it is with children; their first great instructor is example.
SAMUEL SMILESCheerfulness is also an excellent wearing quality. It has been called the bright weather of the heart.
More Samuel Smiles Quotes
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Hope is like the sun, which, as we journey toward it, casts the shadow of our burden behind us.
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The government of a nation itself is usually found to be but the reflux of the individuals composing it. The government that is ahead of the people will be inevitably dragged down to their level, as the government that is behind them will in the long run be dragged up.
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Purposes, like eggs, unless they be hatched into action, will run into rottenness.
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Biographies of great, but especially of good men are most instructive and useful as helps, guides, and incentives to others. Some of the best are almost equivalent to gospels,–teaching high living ,high thinking, and energetic action, for their own and, the world’s good.
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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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The battle of life is, in most cases, fought uphill; and to win it without a struggle were perhaps to win it without honor. If there were no difficulties there would be no success; if there were nothing to struggle for, there would be nothing to be achieved.
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The great high-road of human welfare lies along the old highway of steadfast welldoing; and they who are the most persistent, and work in the truest spirit, will invariably be the most successful.
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National progress is the sum of individual industry, energy, and uprightness, as national decay is of individual idleness, selfishness, and vice.
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Woman is the heart of humanity, its grace, ornament, and solace.
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Self-control is only courage under another form.
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Politeness goes far, yet costs nothing.
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Men who are resolved to find a way for themselves will always find opportunities enough; and if they do not find them, they will make them.
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Energy enables a man to force his way through irksome drudgery and dry details and caries him onward and upward to every station in life.
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The great and good do no die even in this world. Embalmed in books, their spirits walk abroad. The book is a living voice. It is an intellect to which one still listens.
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The great high-road of human welfare lies along the old highway of steadfast, well-doing; and they who are the most persistent, and work in the truest spirit, will invariably be the most successful; success treads on the heels of every right effort.
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