Adversity quotes

As You Like It, Act II, Scene 1, Duke Senior; 1919 Yale Shakespeare edition edited by Jack R. Crawford, printed page 24 / Wikisource scan leaf 36. “Sweet are the uses of adversity” occurs in Duke Senior’s Forest of Arden reflection on exile, winter and the lessons he claims to find outside court life. It remains fictional dramatic speech rather than Shakespeare’s autobiographical advice or a modern psychological claim about hardship.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, saying 595, D. Lyman Jr. translation (1856).

Speech in Canandaigua, New York, August 3, 1857.

Essays of Montaigne, Book I, Chapter XXIII, ‘Various Events from the Same Counsel,’ Charles Cotton translation edited by William Carew Hazlitt (1877); Project Gutenberg Volume 04 #3584 / Complete Essays #3600. Montaigne argues that excessive security-minded distrust can destroy the courage required for noble action; the reviewed direct evidence is the matching Wikisource chapter transcription.

The Twilight of the Idols, “Maxims and Missiles,” maxim 8, Anthony M. Ludovici translation, 1911 Complete Works edition, Project Gutenberg #52263. The source introduces it as “From the military school of life.”

Othello, Act I, Scene III, reviewed against the scan-backed 1910 First Folio facsimile on Wikisource. The Duke tells Brabantio that continuing to spend grief on an irreversible loss only compounds it; the retained modernized wording corresponds to the Folio's 'The rob'd that smiles, steales something from the Thiefe.' It is dramatic counsel inside the scene, not Shakespeare autobiography or clinical grief guidance.

“The Old Stoic,” Project Gutenberg #1019. This is the poem’s closing aspiration and remains a literary statement rather than medical or psychological guidance.

Moral printed after “The Oak and the Woodcutters”; the oak laments wedges made from its own branches.

John 16:33 in the King James Version; excerpt from Jesus’s closing words to the disciples.

Little Women, Chapter 44, “My Lord and Lady,” Project Gutenberg #514. Amy March Laurence says the represented storm/sailing thought while discussing married life with Laurie. The frozen catalog wording expands the source contraction to “I am not afraid of storms,” while the represented #514 text reads “I’m not afraid of storms”; this is a legacy wording variant of the same passage represented by the separate contracted record, not a second independent locus.

Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5; Claudius describes multiple troubles arriving together after Polonius’s death.

Letter 67 considers whether difficult experiences can be desired insofar as they exercise courageous virtue.

The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, saying 35, D. Lyman Jr. translation (1856).

The English Mail-Coach, represented by Project Gutenberg #6359 in the volume The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc. The sentence follows the near-collision / dream-fugue sequence and is highly literary first-person prose, not an objective report of measured time.

Fruit-Gathering, poem LXXIX, translated by Tagore from Bengali; Project Gutenberg #6522. The line is explicitly prayer language and should not be read as advice to ignore real safety precautions.

Self-Control, Its Kingship and Majesty, Chapter XIV, “Failure as a Success,” Project Gutenberg #51469. “Failure is often the turning-point...” follows Jordan’s account of a failed log-rafting experiment that nevertheless generated useful hydrographic observations. The word “often” is retained: this is conduct-of-life rhetoric about possible redirection after failure, not a guarantee that failure produces improvement.

The Time Machine, Project Gutenberg #35. The Time Traveller states this while speculating about the evolution of the Eloi and Morlocks; it is fictional evolutionary reasoning in a nineteenth-century scientific romance, not a current biological law.

Essays of Montaigne, Book III, Chapter XIII, “Of Experience,” Charles Cotton translation; Project Gutenberg Volume 19 #3599 / Complete Essays #3600. Montaigne compares life’s unavoidable mixture of pleasant and painful conditions to harmony made from contrary tones.

Self-Help, Chapter XI, “Self-Culture—Facilities and Difficulties,” Project Gutenberg #935. The passage comes immediately after Hodson’s reflection on resolutely doing difficult duties and continues by presenting difficulty as a stimulus to people of resolution and valour.

Enchiridion, section X, George Long translation; Epictetus gives examples such as endurance under pain and patience under abuse.

Laelius on Friendship; Laelius frames friendship as useful and natural in both good and difficult times.

My Larger Education, Chapter I, “Learning from Men and Things”; Project Gutenberg #73923. Washington connects repeated problem-solving with strength of mind and clearer judgment, contrasting developed capacity with an untested life of ease.