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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.

Samuel Smiles

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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Affect Better Economy Greatness Industry Law Right
Wisdom and understanding can only become the possession of individual men by travelling the old road of observation, attention, perseverance, and industry.
SAMUEL SMILES

Attention Industry Man Old Perseverance Possession Travel Understand Wisdom
Woman is the heart of humanity, its grace, ornament, and solace.
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Grace Heart Humanity Solace Woman
Obedience, submission, discipline, courage–these are among the characteristics which make a man.
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Courage Discipline Man Obedience Submission
Example teaches better than precept. It is the best modeler of the character of men and women. To set a lofty example is the richest bequest a man can leave behind him.
SAMUEL SMILES

Best Better Himself Leaving Man Teaching
The great leader attracts to himself men of kindred character, drawing them towards him as the loadstone draws iron.
SAMUEL SMILES

Character Greatness Himself Leadership
Men cannot be raised in masses as the mountains were in he early geological states of the world. They must be dealt with as units; for it is only by the elevation of individuals that the elevation of the masses can be effectively secured.
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Himself Man Mountain Raise Secure World
Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action; and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing.
SAMUEL SMILES

Action Blessing Fortune Quite
Character is undergoing constant change, for better or for worse–either being elevated on the one hand, or degraded on the other.
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Better Character Charge Hands Worst
The women of the poorer classes make sacrifices, and run risks, and bear privations, and exercise patience and kindness to a degree that the world never knows of, and would scarcely believe even if it did know.
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Believe Patience Poor Sacrifice Woman World
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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Difficult Invention Mom Necessary School
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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Active Best Help Man Nature Necessary
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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Book Goodness Greatness Intellectual Live Oneself Voice
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Cheap Heart Kindness Possible Purse Sacrifice
Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
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External Help
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Greatness Lesson Life Man Noble Record
The most influential of all the virtues are those which are the most in request for daily use. They wear the best, and last the longest.
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Best Influential Long Virtue
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Greatness Human Persistence Success True Work
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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Industry National Progress Selfish
Those who have most to do, and are willing to work, will find the most time.
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Time Willing Work
This extraordinary metal, the soul of every manufacture, and the mainspring perhaps of civilised society. Of iron.
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Civilization Manufacture Metal Soul
Life is of little value unless it be consecrated by duty.
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Life Responsibility Value
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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Application Finding Karma Luck Man Neglect
All life is a struggle…. Under competition the lazy man is put under the necessity of exerting himself; and if he will not exert himself, he must fall behind. If he do not work, neither shall he eat.
SAMUEL SMILES

Competition Eat Himself Life Necessary Struggle Work
Character is itself a fortune.
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Character Fortune One Liner
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Business Life Observation Pursuit Secret Success
Purposes, like eggs, unless they be hatched into action, will run into rottenness.
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Action Egg Purpose Run

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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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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