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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.

Samuel Smiles

Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action; and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing.
SAMUEL SMILES

Action Blessing Fortune Quite
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 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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Greatness Human Persistence Success True Work
Mere political reform will not cure the manifold evils which now afflict society. There requires a social reform, a domestic reform, an individual reform.
SAMUEL SMILES

Cure Domestic Evil Politics Reform
Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
SAMUEL SMILES

External Help
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
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

Greatness Lesson Life Man Noble Record
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

Business Life Observation Pursuit Secret Success
The brave man is an inspiration to the weak, and compels them, as it were, to follow him.
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Brave Follow Himself Man Weakness
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Discipline Family Home Life Training Women
Labour may be a burden and a chastisement, but it is also an honour and a glory. Without it, nothing can be accomplished.
SAMUEL SMILES

Accomplishment Burden Glory Hard Work Honor
This extraordinary metal, the soul of every manufacture, and the mainspring perhaps of civilised society. Of iron.
SAMUEL SMILES

Civilization Manufacture Metal Soul
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Cheap Heart Kindness Possible Purse Sacrifice
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
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.
SAMUEL SMILES

Father Knowledge Learning Life Value
National progress is the sum of individual industry, energy, and uprightness, as national decay is of individual idleness, selfishness, and vice.
SAMUEL SMILES

Industry National Progress Selfish

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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