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It is the open sesame to every portal
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“It is the open sesame to every portal”

William Osler

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Source
The Master-Word in Medicine
Date
1903
Meaning

Meaning of “It is the open sesame to every portal”

The metaphor presents work as a means of opening opportunities that remain inaccessible to intention alone, within Osler’s larger argument for disciplined professional effort.

Source context

Where does it come from?

The Master-Word in Medicine, 1903. “It” refers to the master-word Work in the immediately preceding passage; the source page preserves that antecedent so the excerpt is not detached from its meaning.

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Themes

Ideas connected with this quotation

Discipline Quotes About Habits, Practice & ConsistencyEffortGoalsInspirational Quotes About Hope, Courage & PossibilityMotivational Quotes for Action, Effort & PersistenceProductivityResponsibilitySelf-Control Quotes About Restraint & JudgmentShortSuccessActionMotivation For WorkWork Ethic
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Drive thy business, or it will drive thee.
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“Drive thy business, or it will drive thee.”

Benjamin Franklin · Poor Richard’s Almanack · 1740s
Meaning & context

Work becomes harder to control when it is left unmanaged; the maxim favors deliberate direction, priorities, and active stewardship over reactive pressure.

Source details

Poor Richard’s Almanack; a compact maxim about managing work before accumulated demands begin managing you.

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Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
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“Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.”

Benjamin Franklin · Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin · 1791
Meaning & context

Resolution becomes useful only when followed by execution; the maxim links deliberate standards with the habit of carrying them through.

Source details

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Part II, thirteen-virtue table: Resolution. Project Gutenberg #148 (Charles W. Eliot / Harvard Classics, 1909) preserves the represented wording; the reviewed direct locator is Wikisource Section Thirty Six.

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I would concentrate upon the manufacture of iron and steel and be master in that.
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“I would concentrate upon the manufacture of iron and steel and be master in that.”

Andrew Carnegie · Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie · 1920
Meaning & context

Focused specialization can create depth of knowledge and execution by directing limited attention toward mastering one field instead of scattering effort across many ventures.

Source details

Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie; Carnegie describes his decision to concentrate his business attention on iron and steel.

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Here is my work, here or nowhere.
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“Here is my work, here or nowhere.”

Thomas Carlyle · Latter-Day Pamphlets · 1850
Meaning & context

Carlyle’s imagined capable leader locates responsibility in the actual sphere available to him rather than waiting for a more convenient setting in which to act.

Source details

Latter-Day Pamphlets, No. IV “The New Downing Street”; Project Gutenberg #1140. The sentence occurs inside Carlyle’s controversial political argument about leadership; this collection uses it for work/responsibility while retaining that historical context.

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If you would make anything a habit, do it.
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“If you would make anything a habit, do it.”

Epictetus · Discourses of Epictetus · c. 125
Meaning & context

Habit formation is reduced to repeated action: the behavior itself is what trains the pattern.

Source details

Discourses of Epictetus, Book II, Chapter XVIII, “How we should struggle against appearances,” George Long translation; 1877 George Bell & Sons witness on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #10661. This short catalog record is an excerpt of Long’s longer clause “Generally then if you would make any thing a habit, do it”; this collection lightly normalizes “any thing” to “anything.”

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