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Labour of all kinds is dignifying and honourable
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“Labour of all kinds is dignifying and honourable”

Samuel Smiles

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Source
Thrift
Date
1875
Meaning

Meaning of “Labour of all kinds is dignifying and honourable”

Smiles attaches dignity and honour to labour itself, making useful work part of his account of character and social self-respect.

Source context

Where does it come from?

Thrift, Chapter IV, “Means of Saving,” Project Gutenberg #14418. Smiles is arguing that working people should reject the idea that labour is degrading and use leisure for cultivation; the surrounding passage contains period class judgments that are not adopted as present-day social evidence.

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Themes

Ideas connected with this quotation

Discipline Quotes About Habits, Practice & ConsistencyEffortHard WorkInspirational Quotes About Hope, Courage & PossibilityIntegrityMotivational Quotes for Action, Effort & PersistenceProductivitySelf-Respect Quotes About Dignity & BoundariesShortSuccessDignityMotivation For WorkValuesWork Ethic
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Whatever I have done I have honestly endeavored to do to the best of my ability.
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“Whatever I have done I have honestly endeavored to do to the best of my ability.”

Booker T. Washington · Character Building · 1902
Meaning & context

Honesty and effort are joined in a self-assessment standard based on doing the best one can, rather than on appearance or outside praise.

Source details

Character Building, “What Is To Be Our Future?”, Project Gutenberg #60484. This sentence completes Washington’s model declaration about conscientious study and work.

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No matter what the thing is, put your conscience into it; do your best.
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“No matter what the thing is, put your conscience into it; do your best.”

Booker T. Washington · Character Building · 1902
Meaning & context

Work gains moral weight when effort and conscience remain present even in tasks that seem small, routine, or unlikely to attract praise.

Source details

Character Building, “What Is To Be Our Future?”, Project Gutenberg #60484. Washington asks whether Tuskegee will remain worthy of public confidence and answers by requiring each student and worker to put conscience and full effort into every kind of work.

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I have put my whole soul into my study, into my work, into whatever I have attempted.
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“I have put my whole soul into my study, into my work, into whatever I have attempted.”

Booker T. Washington · Character Building · 1902
Meaning & context

The model statement asks a student to be able to say that study and work received full engagement rather than minimal compliance.

Source details

Character Building, “What Is To Be Our Future?”, Project Gutenberg #60484. Washington offers the sentence as a standard students should be able to affirm about their own effort.

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Labour and skill applied to the vulgarest things invest them at once with precious value.
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“Labour and skill applied to the vulgarest things invest them at once with precious value.”

Samuel Smiles · Thrift · 1875
Meaning & context

Skill can transform ordinary material through workmanship, connecting value not only with the object itself but with knowledgeable effort applied to it.

Source details

Thrift, Chapter I, “Industry,” Project Gutenberg #14418. Smiles moves from mutual dependence among workers to the value added by labour and skill; “vulgarest” preserves the period wording for common or ordinary things.

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The master-word is Work
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“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.

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