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 SMILESThere are many persons of whom it may be said that they have no other possession in the world but their character, and yet they stand as firmly upon it as any crowned king.
More Samuel Smiles Quotes
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The noble people will be nobly ruled, and the ignorant and corrupt ignobly.
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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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The reason why so little is done, is generally because so little is attempted.
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Lost wealth may be replaced by industry, lost knowledge by study, lost health by temperance or medicine, but lost time is gone forever.
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The tiniest bits of opinion sown in the minds of children in private life afterwards issue forth to the world, and become its public opinion; for nations are gathered out of nurseries.
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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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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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He who labours not, cannot enjoy the reward of labour.
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Men whose acts are at variance with their words command no respect, and what they say has but little weight.
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Those who aren’t making mistakes probably aren’t making anything.
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Hope… is the companion of power, and the mother of success; for who so hopes has within him the gift of miracles.
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The truest politeness comes of sincerity.
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The spirit of self-help is the root of all genuine growth in the individual.
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Experience serves to prove that the worth and strength of a state depend far less upon the form of its institutions than upon the character of its men; for the nation is only the aggregate of individual conditions, and civilization itself is but a question of personal, improvement.
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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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