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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.

Samuel Smiles

Any number of depraved units cannot form a great nation.
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Greatness Nation
Enthusiasm, the sustaining power of all great action.
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Action Enthusiasm Greatness Power
There is no act, however trivial, but has its train of consequences.
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Act Consequence Training
Conscience is that peculiar faculty of the soul which may be called the religious instinct.
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Conscience Religious Soul Weird
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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Greatness Human Persistence Success True Work
Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action; and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing.
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Action Blessing Fortune Quite
Commit a child to the care of a worthless, ignorant woman, and no culture in after-life will remedy the evil you have done.
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Children Commitment Evil Ignorance Woman Yourself
One might almost fear,” writes a thoughtful woman, “seeing how the women of to-day are lightly stirred up to run after some new fashion or faith, that heaven is not so near to them as it was to their mothers and grandmothers.
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Faith Fashion Grandmother Mother
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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Greatness Lesson Life Man Noble Record
Riches do not constitute any claim to distinction. It is only the vulgar who admire riches as riches.
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Admire Claim Rich Vulgar
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
It is not ease, but effort-not facility, but difficulty, makes men. There is, perhaps, no station in life in which difficulties have not to be encountered and overcome before any decided measure of success can be achieved.
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Achievement Decision Difficult Effort Station
Great men are always exceptional men; and greatness itself is but comparative. Indeed, the range of most men in life is so limited that very few have the opportunity of being great.
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Compare Greatness Life Limitation Man Opportunity
There are many counterfeits of character, but the genuine article is difficult to be mistaken.
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Article Character Difficult Mistake
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
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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Cheap Heart Kindness Possible Purse Sacrifice
Great men stamp their mind upon their age and nation.
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Age Greatness Man Mindset Nation
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
Life will always be to a large extent what we ourselves make it.
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Inspirational Life Ourselves
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.
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Best Better Himself Leaving Man Teaching
The very greatest things – great thoughts, discoveries, inventions – have usually been nurtured in hardship, often pondered over in sorrow, and at length established with difficulty.
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Difficult Discover Establishment Greatness Sorrow Thinking
The principal industrial excellence of the English people lay in their capacity of present exertion for a distant object.
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Distance Excellence Industrial Object Principle
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. But all play and no work makes him something worse.
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Play Work Worst
The best school of discipline is home. Family life is God’s own method of training the young, and homes are very much as women make them.
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Discipline Family Home Life Training Women
Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
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External Help
We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success. We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery.
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Discover Failure Finding Learning Mistake Wisdom
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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Butterfly Color Learning Service Study

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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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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