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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.

Samuel Smiles

The noble people will be nobly ruled, and the ignorant and corrupt ignobly.
SAMUEL SMILES

Corruption People Rule
The greatest slave is not he who is ruled by a despot, great though that evil be, but he who is in the thrall of his own moral ignorance, selfishness, and vice.
SAMUEL SMILES

Greatness Ignorance Moral Rule Selfish Slave Vice
Necessity, oftener than facility, has been the mother of invention; and the most prolific school of all has been the school of difficulty.
SAMUEL SMILES

Difficult Invention Mom Necessary School
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Faith Fashion Grandmother Mother
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
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Angel Flower Mindset Open Pleasure
Cheerfulness is also an excellent wearing quality. It has been called the bright weather of the heart.
SAMUEL SMILES

Bright Cheer Excellence Heart Quality
Good sense, disciplined by experience and inspired by goodness, issues in practical wisdom.
SAMUEL SMILES

Discipline Experience Goodness Sense Wisdom
Self-respect is the noblest garment with which a man can clothe himself, the most elevating feeling with which the mind can be inspired.
SAMUEL SMILES

Clothes Feeling Himself Man Mindset Noble Respect
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
Cecil’s dispatch of business was extraordinary, his maxim being, “The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at once.”
SAMUEL SMILES

Business Focus Oneself
Progress, of the best kind, is comparatively slow.
SAMUEL SMILES

Best Kind Progress Slow
There is no act, however trivial, but has its train of consequences.
SAMUEL SMILES

Act Consequence Training
Marriage like government is a series of compromises. One must give and take, repair and restrain, endure and be patient.
SAMUEL SMILES

Compromise Endurance Government Marriage Patience Repair
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Action Goodness Greatness World
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Discipline Instruction Life Nature Practice Reality Theory Wisdom

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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