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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

Man cannot aspire if he looked down; if he rise, he must look up.
SAMUEL SMILES

Aspiration Himself Man Rise
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 SMILES

Children Greatness Instruction
The healthy spirit of self-help created among working people would, more than any other measure, serve to raise them as a class; and this, not by pulling down others, but by levelling them up to a higher and still advancing standard of religion, intelligence, and virtue.
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Creation Health Intelligence People Religion Spirit Virtue Work
Labour may be a burden and a chastisement, but it is also an honour and a glory. Without it, nothing can be accomplished.
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Accomplishment Burden Glory Hard Work Honor
The work of many of the greatest men, inspired by duty, has been done amidst suffering and trial and difficulty. They have struggled against the tide, and reached the shore exhausted.
SAMUEL SMILES

Difficult Greatness Man Reach Struggle Suffering Trial Work
There are many counterfeits of character, but the genuine article is difficult to be mistaken.
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Article Character Difficult Mistake
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
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
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
Character is itself a fortune.
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Character Fortune One Liner
Good character is property. It is the noblest of all possessions.
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Character Goodness Noble Possession Property
Progress, of the best kind, is comparatively slow.
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Best Kind Progress Slow
The highest culture is not obtained from the teacher when at school or college, so much as by our ever diligent self-education when we become men.
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Culture Education Man Teacher
To set a lofty example is the richest bequest a man can leave behind.
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Example Leaving Legacy Man
Alexander the Great valued learning so highly, that he used to say he was more indebted to Aristotle for giving him knowledge than to his father Philip for life.
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Father Knowledge Learning Life Value
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Condition Experience Form Improvement Institution Personal Question Service

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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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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