Quote Atlassourced quotes & context
Source identified
Genius is but a capability of labouring intensely: it is the power of making great and sustained efforts.
Read & copy the quotation
“Genius is but a capability of labouring intensely: it is the power of making great and sustained efforts.”

Samuel Smiles

Download image (JPG)

Source
Thrift
Date
1875
Meaning

Meaning of “Genius is but a capability of labouring intensely:…”

Genius is redefined as capacity for sustained effort, emphasizing endurance and application over an image of effortless inspiration.

Source context

Where does it come from?

Thrift, Chapter I, “Industry,” Project Gutenberg #14418. Immediately after linking greatness in art, literature and science with labour, Smiles rhetorically defines genius as a capacity for intense and sustained effort; it is not treated as a modern psychological finding.

Primary / edition source ↗

Customize your imageTen designs · Square or portrait · Preview and share
Themes

Ideas connected with this quotation

ArtConsistencyCreativityDiscipline Quotes About Habits, Practice & ConsistencyEffortHabitsHard WorkInspirational Quotes About Hope, Courage & PossibilityMotivational Quotes for Action, Effort & PersistencePatiencePerseverance Quotes About Sustained EffortProductivitySelf-Control Quotes About Restraint & JudgmentSuccessGreatnessMotivation For WorkWork Ethic
Related quotations

Continue through nearby ideas

Source identified
No great work has ever been done “at a heat.” It is the result of repeated efforts, and often of many failures.
Read & copy

“No great work has ever been done “at a heat.” It is the result of repeated efforts, and often of many failures.”

Samuel Smiles · Thrift · 1875
Meaning & context

Repeated attempts and failure are treated as normal parts of producing substantial work, countering the idea that important creation happens fully formed in one effort.

Source details

Thrift, Chapter I, “Industry,” Project Gutenberg #14418. The sentence immediately follows the poetry example and presents substantial work as the product of repeated effort and failure; the absolute wording is Smiles’s rhetorical generalization.

↓ Download image (JPG)

Source identified
The master-word is Work
Read & copy

“The master-word is Work”

William Osler · The Master-Word in Medicine · 1903
Meaning & context

Osler makes sustained work the organizing principle of his address to medical students, emphasizing disciplined practice over brilliance without application.

Source details

The Master-Word in Medicine, address delivered October 1, 1903 at the opening of the new buildings of the University of Toronto Medical Faculty; reviewed against the represented 1903 John Murphy pamphlet, Internet Archive identifier b28060805. ‘The master-word is Work’ is Osler’s organizing refrain and is followed by his appeal to write the word on the heart and forehead. This remains historical professional rhetoric rather than an endorsement of unsafe working hours or workaholism.

↓ Download image (JPG)