This continuation page contains additional source-backed quotations not shown in the initial 70-quotation overview. Return to the topic guide and browse collection.
“What is the reward most proper for encouraging industry, prudence, and circumspection? Success in every sort of business.”
Smith links practical success with habits of industry, prudence, and careful judgment, while treating that success as the characteristic external reward of those traits.
The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part III; Smith asks what rewards ordinarily encourage industry, prudence, truth, justice, and humanity.
“The rules of justice are accurate in the highest degree, and admit of no exceptions or modifications, but such as may be ascertained as accurately as the rules themselves.”
Smith contrasts justice with looser virtues by arguing that its external obligations require unusually precise rules if people are to rely on one another.
The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part III discussion of the general rules of morality; Smith contrasts exact rules of justice with more flexible rules of prudence and generosity.
“Wages, profit, and rent, are the three original sources of all revenue, as well as of all exchangeable value.”
Smith separates major forms of income according to labour, stock, and land, providing a historical framework for how revenue is distributed.
The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter VI; Project Gutenberg #3300. The statement is part of Smith’s eighteenth-century theory of price and income distribution.
“Self-help is the best help.”
Asking for help does not replace the responsibility to make the effort that is already within one’s own power.
Moral printed after “Hercules and the Wagoner” in the Townsend translation; Hercules first tells the driver to help himself.
“Slow but steady wins the race.”
Steady progress can defeat greater natural speed when the faster competitor becomes careless, distracted, or overconfident.
Moral printed after “The Hare and the Tortoise” in George Fyler Townsend’s translation of Aesop’s fables.
“Misfortunes springing from ourselves are the hardest to bear.”
Harm is especially painful when our own choices, tools, or contributions helped create the conditions that made the loss possible.
Moral printed after “The Oak and the Woodcutters”; the oak laments wedges made from its own branches.
“I wish'd the man a dinner, and sat still.”
The satirical speaker portrays restraint as refusing to escalate a literary attack, answering hostility with a comic wish that the critic’s need might be relieved.
An Epistle from Mr. Pope to Dr. Arbuthnot (1735 first-edition scan), printed page 8 / scan leaf 14, around lines 148–150. After saying Gildon drew his “venal quill,” Pope says he wished him a dinner and did not answer the attack. The first edition reads “sate still,” while the later/normalized Gutenberg #9800 witness underlying the frozen catalog reads “sat still”; this collection wording is retained and the witness variation is disclosed rather than silently rewritten.
“What then remains but well our pow'r to use, And keep good-humour still whate'er we lose?”
Within Clarissa’s speech, the practical response to inevitable loss is to use one’s capacities well and preserve composure rather than trying to make change impossible.
The Rape of the Lock, Canto V, lines 29–30 in Pope’s 1717 revision; spoken by Clarissa. Her speech was added in 1717, so the inherited 1714 source year is corrected to 1717. Clarissa’s counsel is immediately followed by the poem’s return to comic battle, preserving the satirical frame.
“But there is this terrible thing in evil thoughts, that evil minds soon grow familiar with them.”
The narrator warns that repeatedly entertaining a harmful idea can reduce the resistance a person initially feels toward acting on it.
The Black Tulip, Chapter VIII, “An Invasion,” Project Gutenberg #965. Exact-witness review corrects the inherited Chapter VI locator: the narrator says that evil minds soon grow familiar with evil thoughts immediately after Boxtel first shrinks from informing against Van Baerle and before he rationalizes the act.
“To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
The closing sequence turns purpose into continuing action: effort, search, discovery, and refusal to surrender.
Poem “Ulysses,” final line.
“I would concentrate upon the manufacture of iron and steel and be master in that.”
Focused specialization can create depth of knowledge and execution by directing limited attention toward mastering one field instead of scattering effort across many ventures.
Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie; Carnegie describes his decision to concentrate his business attention on iron and steel.
“A small daily task, if it be really daily, will beat the labours of a spasmodic Hercules.”
Trollope argues that modest work performed every day can outperform irregular bursts of heroic effort because a repeatable routine keeps progress accumulating.
An Autobiography, Chapter VII, Project Gutenberg #5978. Trollope describes his self-imposed quota and record-keeping system before saying that a genuinely daily small task can beat spasmodic heroic labour. It is autobiographical reflection on his own working method, not a universal productivity or health prescription.
“Virtue then is a state apt to exercise deliberate choice, being in the relative mean, determined by reason.”
Virtue is treated as a stable capacity for deliberate choice, guided by practical judgment rather than by extremes of impulse or deficiency.
Nicomachean Ethics, Book II, Chapter VI; the public-domain English translation defines virtue through deliberate choice and the relative mean.
“The only cure is to reconstitute the programme, and to attempt less.”
When a schedule becomes oppressive, Bennett recommends reducing the plan rather than allowing the plan itself to dominate the person it was meant to help.
How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, “Dangers to Avoid.” Bennett is warning against becoming enslaved to an over-ambitious personal programme; “attempt less” is adjustment advice, not a general rejection of ambition.
“These crests only rise on the back of constant labour.”
Peak creative moments are described as resting on repeated labor, rejecting the idea that successful writing can be separated from sustained preparation.
On The Art of Reading, Lecture V, Project Gutenberg #16579; “crests” refers to exceptional moments of successful writing described immediately before.
“So, in writing, only out of long preparation can come the truly triumphant flash”
The sudden-looking breakthrough is placed at the end of preparation rather than outside it: memorable execution is supported by work accumulated beforehand.
On The Art of Reading, Lecture V, Project Gutenberg #16579; excerpted from Quiller-Couch’s analogy between writing practice and concentrated performance.
“Murder your darlings.”
The memorable command advises writers to delete showy passages they love when those passages serve vanity or ornament more than the work as a whole.
On the Art of Writing, Lecture XII, “On Style,” Project Gutenberg #17470; the phrase concludes Quiller-Couch’s warning against purchased or extraneous ornament.
“That you must master the secret for yourselves lay implicit in our bargain, and you were never promised that a writer's training would be easy.”
Learning to write is presented as demanding practice rather than a shortcut: difficulty belongs to the training and does not by itself signal failure.
On the Art of Writing, Lecture XII, “On Style,” Project Gutenberg #17470; excerpted from Quiller-Couch’s reminder that students must master craft for themselves.
“less depends upon what befalls us than upon the way in which it is met”
The maxim shifts attention from events alone to the way a person receives and interprets them, making response and temperament part of Schopenhauer’s account of well-being.
The Wisdom of Life, T. Bailey Saunders translation; Project Gutenberg #10741. This is a philosophical claim about temperament, not a denial that external circumstances can matter greatly.
“Blessedness is not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself;”
Spinoza argues that the highest form of flourishing is not an external prize paid for virtuous conduct but is bound up with the activity he calls virtue itself.
Ethics, Part V, Proposition XLII, R. H. M. Elwes translation represented by Project Gutenberg #3800. ‘Blessedness is not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself’ introduces Spinoza's proposition linking blessedness, knowledge, virtue and control of the emotions. It remains translation-mediated seventeenth-century metaphysical ethics, not a universal psychological measurement or clinical prescription.
“Waste neither Time nor Money, but make the best Use of both.”
Franklin compresses practical discipline into stewardship of two limited resources: time and money.
Advice to a Young Tradesman, 21 July 1748; concluding advice on industry and frugality.
“Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.”
Resolution becomes useful only when followed by execution; the maxim links deliberate standards with the habit of carrying them through.
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.
“America is the Land of Labour”
Franklin rejects European fantasies of effortless prosperity in eighteenth-century North America, emphasizing that newcomers should expect productive labor rather than automatic wealth or patronage.
Information to Those Who Would Remove to America, before March 1784; Founders Online. This is historical emigration advice written for Europeans and is not a claim about present-day U.S. labor or immigration conditions.
“he must work and be industrious to live.”
Franklin tells prospective emigrants without inherited wealth that livelihood would depend on work and industry, directly countering expectations of effortless advancement after arrival.
Information to Those Who Would Remove to America, before March 1784; Founders Online. The lowercase opening is retained because this is a clause from Franklin’s longer sentence about strangers, law, liberty and industry.
“every one will enjoy securely the Profits of his Industry.”
Franklin presents secure enjoyment of earned returns as one advantage he associated with laws and liberty in the North America of his period.
Information to Those Who Would Remove to America, before March 1784; Founders Online. The statement is eighteenth-century description and advocacy, not modern financial, employment or immigration guidance.
“Little strokes fell great oaks.”
Small repeated efforts can accomplish work that seems too large for a single burst of effort, making consistency itself a practical form of strength.
Poor Richard’s Almanack; a compact maxim about cumulative effort.
“Well done is better than well said.”
Franklin gives execution priority over impressive promises or intentions.
Poor Richard’s Almanack.
“Diligence is the mother of good luck.”
Persistent effort improves the odds of useful results because steady work creates more opportunities for progress than waiting for favorable circumstances.
Poor Richard’s Almanack; the maxim appears in Franklin’s collected Poor Richard material.
“Drive thy business, or it will drive thee.”
Work becomes harder to control when it is left unmanaged; the maxim favors deliberate direction, priorities, and active stewardship over reactive pressure.
Poor Richard’s Almanack; a compact maxim about managing work before accumulated demands begin managing you.
“Employ thy time well, if thou meanest to gain leisure.”
Leisure is easier to protect when working time is used deliberately, linking time management with freedom rather than treating organization as an end in itself.
Poor Richard’s Almanack; the maxim connects disciplined use of working time with the ability to gain leisure.
“Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
The proverb links routine and self-discipline with health, productivity, and practical judgment.
Poor Richard’s Almanack; proverb on routine, work and practical discipline.
“Hide not your talents. They for use were made. What’s a sundial in the shade?”
Ability has little practical value when it is permanently hidden; talent becomes useful through application and visibility.
Poor Richard’s Almanack.
“If your adversary is long in playing, you ought not to hurry him.”
Franklin makes patience part of fair competition, arguing that disturbing an opponent’s concentration displays rudeness or craft rather than genuine skill.
Benjamin Franklin, The Morals of Chess, rule 4 in the reviewed public-domain Wikisource transcription. Franklin tells a player not to hurry or distract a slow opponent and immediately lists singing, whistling, watch-checking, reading and tapping as examples; the passage is historical conduct advice about fair play.
“No false move should ever be made to extricate yourself out of a difficulty, or to gain an advantage.”
Franklin uses a rule of fair chess play as an ethical analogy: escaping difficulty through deception destroys trust and turns apparent advantage into unfair conduct.
Benjamin Franklin, The Morals of Chess, rule 3 in the reviewed public-domain Wikisource transcription. 'No false move should ever be made...' appears in Franklin's etiquette for fair play and functions as an ethical analogy about honesty in competition, not game-theory or behavioral-science evidence.
“At a great pennyworth pause a while.”
An unusually cheap offer deserves scrutiny because apparent savings can still produce a bad purchase when the buyer has no real need for it.
The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. The maxim introduces Franklin’s distinction between apparent cheapness and genuine value.
“Ere fancy you consult, consult your purse.”
Desired appearance should be tested against actual means before spending, placing affordability ahead of fashion or social comparison.
The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. The line appears in a short verse warning against pride-driven spending on dress.
“Never leave that till tomorrow, which you can do to-day.”
The maxim turns prompt action into a habit: work that can reasonably be completed now should not be needlessly transferred to an uncertain tomorrow.
The Way to Wealth; a Poor Richard maxim on delay and useful employment of time.
“Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink a great ship.”
Small recurring costs can matter more than they appear individually, so careful attention to minor spending is part of long-term financial discipline.
The Way to Wealth; Father Abraham repeats the Poor Richard maxim while warning about small but cumulative expenses.
“If you would be wealthy, think of saving as well as of getting.”
Income alone does not create financial security; keeping part of what is earned is presented as a necessary companion to earning it.
The Way to Wealth, Franklin’s compilation of Poor Richard maxims.
“Beware of little expences; A small leak will sink a great ship.”
Small recurring expenses can become significant when repeated, so minor purchases deserve attention when they steadily erode a limited budget.
The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855 preserves the historical spelling “expences.” The ship image is one of the Poor Richard maxims quoted by Father Abraham.
“Buy what thou hast no need of, and ere long thou shalt sell thy necessaries.”
Unnecessary consumption can eventually threaten necessary resources, making restraint a practical part of financial independence.
The Way to Wealth, section III, frugality discussion, Project Gutenberg #43855. Father Abraham repeats the Poor Richard maxim “Buy what thou hast no need of, and ere long thou shalt sell thy necessaries” while warning auction-goers that an apparent bargain can become dear when the purchase is unnecessary. The persona and eighteenth-century moral-financial context remain explicit; this is not individualized financial advice.
“Always taking out of the meal-tub, and never putting in, soon comes to the bottom.”
Resources decline when withdrawals are not matched by replenishment, turning a household image into a warning about spending down finite savings.
The Way to Wealth, frugality section; Project Gutenberg #43855. The meal-tub is Franklin’s domestic metaphor for continual consumption without replacement.
“Do your work quietly.”
Useful work does not need constant display; quiet concentration can keep attention on the quality of the task rather than recognition for performing it.
Character Building, “Some Great Little Things,” Project Gutenberg #60484. Washington places this instruction among small daily habits of order, quiet, cleanliness, reading and reflection that he treats as important parts of character formation.
“Get into the habit of being orderly and neat.”
Order is treated as trainable behavior that reduces avoidable friction and supports reliability in work, study, and shared environments.
Character Building, “Some Great Little Things,” Project Gutenberg #60484. Washington tells students to make order and neatness habitual in crowded rooms, immediately before his advice to work and close doors quietly.
“No matter what the thing is, put your conscience into it; do your best.”
Work gains moral weight when effort and conscience remain present even in tasks that seem small, routine, or unlikely to attract praise.
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.
“puts his whole conscience into that work, and does it just as thoroughly as it is possible for him to do it.”
Conscience is applied to ordinary manual work, making thoroughness a matter of character even when the task is mortar-mixing or bricklaying.
Character Building, “The Virtue of Simplicity,” Project Gutenberg #60484. The sentence refers specifically to students doing building work at Tuskegee.
“you are going to put into this year the hardest and the most earnest work that you have ever done in your life”
Washington turns a broad desire for growth into a concrete commitment to more earnest effort over the coming year.
Character Building, “Growth,” Project Gutenberg #60484. The line is part of an exhortation to Tuskegee students at the beginning of a new period of study.
“begin to-morrow morning, every boy and girl, to be reliable and to keep at it until reliability becomes a part of you.”
Reliability is treated as a habit built by repeated dependable action, not a trait someone either permanently has or lacks.
Character Building, “Keeping Your Word,” Project Gutenberg #60484. Washington directs the advice to Tuskegee students in the context of promptness and keeping commitments.
“My race will succeed in proportion as it learns to do a common thing in an uncommon manner.”
Distinctive success can come from doing ordinary work unusually well, emphasizing thoroughness and indispensable usefulness rather than status.
Up from Slavery, Chapter XVI, “Europe,” Project Gutenberg #2376. While discussing Henry O. Tanner and recognition for excellent work, Washington restates his Tuskegee principle that advancement depends on doing useful work so thoroughly that its value becomes difficult to ignore.
“No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.”
Useful labor is given equal moral dignity with prestigious intellectual work; prosperity requires skill and respect for necessary occupations.
Up from Slavery, Chapter XIV, “The Atlanta Exposition Address,” Project Gutenberg #2376. The sentence occurs inside Washington’s reproduced 1895 Atlanta Exposition address, where he argues for the dignity of common labour and beginning economic development from practical foundations.
“But I kept at it”
The short phrase summarizes Washington’s response to repeated failure while learning demanding household work under Mrs. Ruffner’s supervision.
Working With the Hands, Chapter I; Project Gutenberg #64504. This is an autobiographical fragment whose surrounding paragraph describes repeated attempts before improvement.
“let him simplify his baggage.”
Wagner turns simplification into a practical test: remove secondary burdens so attention and effort can return to what is genuinely essential.
The Simple Life, Chapter II, Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; the phrase appears in Wagner’s argument for returning attention to essentials.
“Then let us cultivate silence.”
Silence is presented as part of communication discipline: not every thought needs immediate verbal display, and restraint can preserve attention and meaning.
The Simple Life, Chapter IV, “Simplicity of Speech,” Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; Wagner recommends silence after criticizing needless verbal noise.
“aspire to simplicity of speech.”
Plain expression is treated as a discipline: the speaker should reduce distortion, display and needless verbal complication rather than hiding meaning behind rhetoric.
The Simple Life, Chapter IV, “Simplicity of Speech,” Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; the sentence introduces Wagner’s appeal for plainer speech.
“All that we can save in noise we gain in power.”
Reducing verbal noise is framed as conservation of attention: less unnecessary expression can leave more force for what genuinely needs to be said or done.
The Simple Life, Chapter IV, “Simplicity of Speech,” Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; the sentence develops Wagner’s argument for cultivated silence.
“Where the natural law rules in the heart, disorder vanishes.”
Wagner links simplicity with inner order, arguing that clear governing principles can reduce the confusion produced by competing impulses.
The Simple Life, Chapter II, Mary Louise Hendee translation, Project Gutenberg #23092; the sentence belongs to Wagner’s moral account of inward order.
“Does the road wind up-hill all the way? Yes, to the very end.”
The compact dialogue makes the difficulty of the road explicit while also committing to continuing all the way to its end.
“Up-Hill,” in Goblin Market and Other Poems (1862); Project Gutenberg #16950. The road is a spiritual-life allegory, so the line is not reduced to literal travel advice.
“For I now call a freedom from anxiety a security, on which freedom a happy life depends.”
Cicero treats inner security as freedom from destabilizing anxiety, making mental steadiness an important condition of a genuinely happy and self-directed life.
Tusculan Disputations, Book V, section XIV, represented by Project Gutenberg #14988. Cicero defines security parenthetically as freedom from anxiety while arguing that a happy life must rest on stable goods and virtue rather than vulnerable externals. It remains ancient philosophical psychology mediated by translation, not modern clinical anxiety-treatment evidence.
“To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.”
Recognizing the right course is incomplete if fear or convenience prevents a person from acting on that judgment.
The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book II connects moral recognition with the courage required for action.
“Is it not pleasant to learn with a constant perseverance and application?”
Learning becomes satisfying when it is sustained through repeated application rather than treated as a single act of exposure.
The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book I opens by connecting learning with steady practice.
“The superior man wishes to be slow in his speech and earnest in his conduct.”
Restraint in speech is paired with seriousness in action, placing demonstrated conduct above impressive but unproven words.
The Analects of Confucius, James Legge’s public-domain English translation; Book IV contrasts careful speech with earnest conduct.
“The superior man is satisfied and composed; the mean man is always full of distress.”
The contrast treats composure as a feature of cultivated character rather than as freedom from all difficulty: the “superior man” is represented as settled enough not to live in continual inward distress.
The Analects of Confucius, Book VII, Chapter XXXVI, James Legge translation, Project Gutenberg #3330.
“Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.”
Finishing and enduring are given more weight than the excitement of starting or the pride of appearance.
Ecclesiastes 7:8 in the King James Version; the verse contrasts patient spirit with pride and values the completed end of a matter over the excitement of its beginning.
“Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.”
The instruction favors wholehearted effort in the work available now rather than waiting for a perfect task or perfect mood.
Ecclesiastes 9:10, King James Version.
“I simply look upon them with contempt for their poorness of character.”
Thornton distinguishes his response to self-indulgence from hatred, revealing the severe ethic of self-denial through which he judges character.
North and South, represented by Project Gutenberg #4276. John Thornton speaks this sentence while recounting family hardship and the disciplined habits his mother taught him; it is historically situated fictional characterization, not Gaskell issuing a universal moral ranking.
“I know the goal to high achievement lies through the dull pathway of self-conquest first”
Achievement is pictured as beginning with less glamorous inward work—self-command, small duties and repeated effort—before larger results become possible.
Poems of Progress and New Thought Pastels, “Time’s Gaze,” represented 1913 edition; Project Gutenberg #3228. This is poetic moral counsel, not a universal formula for achievement.
“Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:”
Anger is acknowledged without giving it unlimited permission: the emphasis is on preventing the emotion from becoming harmful conduct or prolonged resentment.
Ephesians 4:26 in the King James Version, in a section about truthful speech, reconciliation, and conduct within community.
“We shall both be cautious and confident, and indeed confident because of our caution.”
Epictetus rejects confidence as recklessness: confidence becomes rational when caution is directed toward one’s own judgments and choices rather than toward externals that cannot be controlled.
Discourses of Epictetus, Book II, Chapter I, “That confidence (courage) is not inconsistent with caution,” George Long translation; 1877 George Bell & Sons witness on Wikisource, cross-checked against Project Gutenberg #10661. Epictetus distinguishes confidence toward externals from moral caution in the use of one’s own will.
“Wish the things which happen to be as they are.”
The advice is not passivity; it is a call to stop fighting reality before deciding how to respond to it.
A concise clause from Enchiridion 8, where Epictetus contrasts demanding preferred outcomes with accepting what occurs.
“Remember that you must behave in life as at a dinner party.”
The dinner-party image recommends waiting for what comes in proper order instead of grabbing anxiously, turning restraint into a model for daily conduct.
Enchiridion, chapter 15; the following sentences explain waiting until things come round to you.
“Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things.”
Epictetus separates an event from the judgment placed on it, making interpretation a practical point of leverage.
Enchiridion 5 in George Long’s translation; the passage distinguishes events from the opinions that disturb us.
“When you have decided that a thing ought to be done, and are doing it, never avoid being seen doing it.”
Once judgment has concluded an action is right, misplaced criticism should not become a reason to hide or abandon the action.
Enchiridion, chapter 35, George Long translation; the following sentence distinguishes right action from fear of wrong criticism.
“Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.”
Peace is sought by aligning desire with reality rather than requiring reality to obey preference, a central Stoic distinction between response and circumstance.
Enchiridion, section 8; Epictetus applies Stoic acceptance to events outside personal control.
“True instruction is this:—to learn to wish that each thing should come to pass as it does.”
Stoic instruction begins by reducing the conflict between reality and demand, leaving judgment and action to work with what actually occurs.
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, saying XXVI, Hastings Crossley translation.
“You must know that it is no easy thing for a principle to become a man’s own, unless each day he maintain it and hear it maintained, as well as work it out in life.”
Principles become character through repetition: they must be rehearsed, tested, and practiced until they survive ordinary pressure.
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus, saying XXX, Hastings Crossley translation.
“I attribute my success to this:—I never gave or took an excuse.”
Nightingale describes her working habit as acting on responsibility rather than accepting excuses when practical failures required correction.
Letter to Miss H. Bonham Carter [1861], transcribed in Sir Edward Cook, The Life of Florence Nightingale, Vol. I, Project Gutenberg #40057. The sentence follows Nightingale’s account of correcting a hotel cistern failure and represents her own retrospective claim about her working method.
“But still night after night the game was played.”
The brief sentence makes repetition itself visible: improvement continues after early success because practice is maintained night after night.
The Lost Prince; Project Gutenberg #384. 'The game' is the boys’ repeated training exercise in memory, recognition and recall.
“A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green.”
Revenge can keep an injury psychologically active long after the original event, making resentment a way of repeatedly reopening the hurt.
Bacon, “Of Revenge”; the sentence continues by contrasting revenge with wounds that would otherwise heal.
“In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior.”
Bacon argues that retaliation merely mirrors the wrong, whereas refusing revenge can restore agency by ending the cycle instead of remaining governed by the injury.
Francis Bacon, essay IV ‘Of Revenge,’ represented by Project Gutenberg #575. The frozen catalog sentence capitalizes the extracted opening ‘In’ and ends after ‘superior’; the witness reads it inside the longer sentence beginning ‘Certainly, in taking revenge...’ and continuing ‘for it is a prince's part to pardon.’ It remains early-modern moral and legal-political essay argument rather than modern clinical anger guidance.
“Yet I did hope for success, and persisted in the undertaking.”
Douglass links hope with continued effort: uncertainty about the outcome does not prevent him from persisting in a difficult undertaking.
My Bondage and My Freedom; Douglass is recounting one of the practical struggles through which persistence accompanied his pursuit of greater freedom and independence.
“Opportunity is important but exertion is indispensable.”
Douglass grants the importance of opportunity while insisting that sustained exertion remains necessary for achievement, refusing to let either circumstance or effort erase the importance of the other.
Self-Made Men lecture, commonly dated to 1872 in edited versions. Library of Congress preserves undated manuscript, typescript and printed-copy materials, including a later Carlisle version; Douglass delivered and revised the lecture across his speaking career. The lecture also stresses social interdependence, so this line should not be reduced to a simplistic bootstrap claim.
“A gentleman has no right to hurt a woman under any circumstances.”
Sergius recognizes that his claim to gentlemanly honor is incompatible with having physically hurt Louka, even though the scene also exposes his unstable chivalric self-image.
Arms and the Man, Act II, Project Gutenberg #3618. Sergius says “A gentleman has no right to hurt a woman under any circumstances” while apologizing after gripping Louka hard enough to bruise her; Louka immediately challenges the adequacy of his apology. The line is fictional dramatic dialogue that exposes contradictions in Sergius’s chivalric self-image rather than a complete legal or relationship rule.
“the strongest principle of growth lies in human choice.”
The sentence connects collective growth with deliberate choice, but its meaning in the novel is political and historical rather than a generic slogan about individual self-improvement.
Daniel Deronda; spoken by Mordecai during his argument about Jewish national renewal, action, memory and a future Judea. The specific speaker and political-religious context are essential.
“Activity does not consist in velocity of change but in constancy of purpose.”
Being busy or changing quickly is not the same as purposeful action; continuity of aim gives activity its direction.
The Life of Reason; the line appears in Santayana’s analysis of ideas, activity, and sustained direction.
“Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim.”
Effort becomes self-defeating when intensity replaces reflection about the purpose the effort was supposed to serve.
The Life of Reason; Santayana uses the maxim to distinguish purposeful activity from effort that has lost its governing end.
“An invisible man is a man of power.”
Griffin treats invisibility primarily as power over other people, foreshadowing how technological possibility without restraint becomes domination and danger in the novel.
The Invisible Man, Chapter IX, “Mr. Thomas Marvel,” Project Gutenberg #5230. Griffin tells Thomas Marvel that “An invisible man is a man of power” while coercing the frightened stranger into becoming his helper; Chapter X begins immediately after this exchange. The line remains fictional character speech within Wells’s critique of Griffin’s power fantasy rather than a general endorsement of domination.
“What is the value of any political freedom, but as a means to moral freedom?”
Thoreau asks whether political liberty has fulfilled its purpose if people remain governed inwardly by prejudice, appetite or social pressures that prevent independent moral life.
Life Without Principle, The Atlantic Monthly, 1863; represented Wikisource text. The surrounding passage contrasts formal national freedom with what Thoreau calls moral freedom.
“An efficient and valuable man does what he can, whether the community pay him for it or not.”
Thoreau defines useful activity independently of external payment, arguing that a person committed to meaningful work continues to exercise ability even when the community does not reward it.
Life Without Principle, The Atlantic Monthly, 1863; represented Wikisource text. The line follows Thoreau’s claim that a community cannot buy a wise person away from work that genuinely occupies him.
“Still achieving, still pursuing, learn to labour and to wait.”
Progress is pictured as a combination of effort and patience rather than nonstop urgency.
A Psalm of Life, final line.
“The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight.”
Sustained achievement is presented as the result of continued effort rather than a single dramatic leap.
Poem “The Ladder of St. Augustine.”
“Freedom resides in individual self-conquest.”
Within Allen’s spiritual argument, freedom begins with mastery of impulses and ignorance before it can be discussed as an outward condition.
All These Things Added (1903), Part II, “The Heavenly Life,” chapter “Perfect Freedom,” printed page 139 / Wikisource scan leaf 145. “Freedom resides in individual self-conquest” appears in Allen’s contrast between outward agitation and the inward emancipation he associates with mastery of passion, error and ignorance; this remains his spiritual-moral conception of freedom, not a modern political definition.
“By self-enlightenment is Perfect Freedom found.”
Allen connects freedom with understanding one’s own desires, emotions and thought patterns rather than treating liberty as purely external.
All These Things Added (1903), Part II, “The Heavenly Life,” chapter “Perfect Freedom,” printed page 138 / Wikisource scan leaf 144. “By self-enlightenment is Perfect Freedom found” opens Allen’s argument that inward self-knowledge and self-mastery are prerequisites for the freedom he describes. The explicitly religious and moral framework is retained rather than converted into modern political, clinical or psychological guidance.
“He who would achieve much must sacrifice much.”
Large aims usually require giving up some competing comforts, distractions, or immediate rewards.
As a Man Thinketh, “Achievement”; this is the middle clause of Allen’s three-part conclusion.
“Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.”
Calmness is treated as a cultivated capacity arising from self-control and understanding rather than as a temperament a person either possesses or lacks.
As a Man Thinketh, chapter “Serenity”; Allen presents calmness as the result of long and patient effort in self-control.
“Not what he wishes and prays for does a man get, but what he justly earns.”
Wanting an outcome is separated from doing the work and developing the character that can sustain it.
As a Man Thinketh, chapter “Effect of Thought on Circumstances.”
“Victories attained by right thought can only be maintained by watchfulness.”
Reaching a good result is not the end of the work; maintaining it requires continued attention to the habits and judgments that produced it.
As a Man Thinketh, chapter “The Thought-Factor in Achievement.”
“Man is the keeper of his heart; the watcher of his mind; the solitary sentinel of his citadel of life.”
Self-command is pictured as watchfulness: repeated attention to thought matters because neglected patterns can gradually direct conduct without deliberate choice.
Out from the Heart; Allen uses the sentinel image while describing responsibility for guarding and ordering one’s thought.
“Where there are wrong conditions of mind there is bondage and unrest; where there are right conditions of mind there is freedom and peace.”
Allen uses a sharp contrast between mental unrest and peace to argue that repeated inner conditions shape how freedom or bondage is experienced within his conduct-of-life philosophy.
Out from the Heart, “Mental Conditions and Their Effects,” represented New York R. F. Fenno & Company edition, Project Gutenberg #74178. The sentence introduces Allen’s table of harmful and beneficial mental conditions; its moral-philosophical categories are preserved as historical argument rather than modern psychological diagnosis.
“Do vigorously, and at once, whatever has to be done.”
The rule turns decision into immediate execution, treating delay as an obstacle to disciplined and purposeful action.
The Mastery of Destiny, “Training of the Will,” rule four; Wikisource 1909 text. It is practical self-discipline advice in Allen’s period framework.
“Holiness alone is undying peace.”
Allen contrasts lasting peace with temporary comfort or outward victory, then immediately connects the durable state he describes with self-control and an increasing orientation toward wisdom.
The Way of Peace, “The Realization of Perfect Peace,” Project Gutenberg #10740. The sentence follows Allen’s contrast between temporary peace from comfort or worldly victory and what he calls the enduring “Peace of Heaven”; the theological framework is retained rather than recast as clinical advice.
