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Whatever is done for men takes away from the stimulus and necessity of doing things for themselves. The value of legislative as an agent in human advancement has been much over-estimated. No laws, however stringent, can make the idle industrious, the thriftless provident or the drunken sober.

Samuel Smiles

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Samuel Smiles
Age: 91 †
Born: 1812
Born: December 23
Died: 1904
Died: April 16
Author
Biographer
Journalist
Philosopher
Writer
Haddington
East Lothian
Make
Law
Sober
Stringent
Things
Whatever
Idle
Estimated
Men
Values
Necessity
Drunken
Away
Agents
Industrious
Human
Laws
Legislative
Humans
However
Stimulus
Done
Value
Advancement
Much
Takes
Agent
Provident

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Even happiness itself may become habitual. There is a habit of looking at the bright side of things, and also of looking at the dark side.
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Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing.
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The work of many of the greatest men, inspired by duty, has been done amidst suffering and trial and difficulty. They have struggled against the tide, and reached the shore exhausted.
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Conscience is that peculiar faculty of the soul which may be called the religious instinct.
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All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. But all play and no work makes him something worse.
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Enthusiasm..the sustaining power of all great action
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Self-respect is the noblest garment with which a man can clothe himself, the most elevating feeling with which the mind can be inspired.
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So much does the moral health depend upon the moral atmosphere that is breathed, and so great is the influence daily exercised by parents over their children by living a life before their eyes, that perhaps the best system of parental instruction might be summed up in these two words: 'Improve thyself.'
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It is not ease, but effort-not facility, but difficulty, makes men. There is, perhaps, no station in life in which difficulties have not to be encountered and overcome before any decided measure of success can be achieved.
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Diligence, above all, is the mother of good luck.
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Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.
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The brave man is an inspiration to the weak, and compels them, as it were, to follow him.
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The best school of discipline is home. Family life is God's own method of training the young, and homes are very much as women make them.
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It is a mistake to suppose that men succeed through success they much oftener succeed through failures. Precept, study, advice, and example could never have taught them so well as failure has done.
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The tiniest bits of opinion sown in the minds of children in private life afterwards issue forth to the world, and become its public opinion for nations are gathered out of nurseries.
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With will one can do anything.
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Genius, without work, is certainly a dumb oracle, and it is unquestionably true that the men of the highest genius have invariably been found to be amongst the most plodding, hard-working, and intent men -- their chief characteristic apparently consisting simply in their power of laboring more intensely and effectively than others.
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Example teaches better than precept. It is the best modeler of the character of men and women. To set a lofty example is the richest bequest a man can leave behind him.
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The great high-road of human welfare lies along the old highway of steadfast welldoing and they who are the most persistent, and work in the truest spirit, will invariably be the most successful.
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Energy enables a man to force his way through irksome drudgery and dry details and caries him onward and upward to every station in life.
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