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The possession of a library, or the free use of it, no more constitutes learning, than the possession of wealth constitutes generosity.

Samuel Smiles

Like men, nations are purified and strengthened by trials.
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Man Nation Purity Strength
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.”
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Business Focus Oneself
Success treads on the heels of every right effort; and though it is possible to overestimate success to the extent of almost deifying it, as is sometimes done, still in any worthy pursuit it is meritorious.
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Pursuit Success Worth
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
Marriage like government is a series of compromises. One must give and take, repair and restrain, endure and be patient.
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Compromise Endurance Government Marriage Patience Repair
Any number of depraved units cannot form a great nation.
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Greatness Nation
The noble people will be nobly ruled, and the ignorant and corrupt ignobly.
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Corruption People Rule
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
Self-respect is the noblest garment with which a man can clothe himself, the most elevating feeling with which the mind can be inspired.
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Clothes Feeling Himself Man Mindset Noble Respect
Self-control is only courage under another form.
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Control Courage Form
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
Life will always be to a large extent what we ourselves make it.
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Inspirational Life Ourselves
Work is one of the best educators of practical character.
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Best Education Practice 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
Hope is like the sun, which, as we journey toward it, casts the shadow of our burden behind us.
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Burden Hope Journey Ourselves Shadow Sun
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
He who never made a mistake, never made a discovery.
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Discover Himself Mistake
The Romans rightly employed the same word (virtus) to designate courage, which is, in a physical sense, what the other is in a moral; the highest virtue of all being victory over ourselves.
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Courage Ourselves Roman Virtue Word
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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Condition Experience Form Improvement Institution Personal Question Service
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
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
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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Business Life Observation Pursuit Secret Success
Those who have most to do, and are willing to work, will find the most time.
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Time Willing Work
The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at once.
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Focus Short Way
There are many counterfeits of character, but the genuine article is difficult to be mistaken.
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Article Character Difficult Mistake
Politeness goes far, yet costs nothing.
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Cost Polite
Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
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External Help

The possession of a library, or the free use of it, no more constitutes learning, than the possession of wealth constitutes generosity.

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The possession of a library, or the free use of it, no more constitutes learning, than the possession of wealth constitutes generosity.

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