The quote database

The burdens of government should as far as practicable be distributed justly and equally among all classes of our population.

Remember, then, that I, at least, have warned you, that the happiness of your life, and its power, and its part and rank in earth or in heaven, depend on the way you pass your days now.

Those only are happy (I thought) who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness; on the happiness of others, on the improvement of mankind, even on some art or pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an ideal end.

In all public expenditures the most rigid economy should be resorted to, and, as one of its results, a public debt in time of peace be sedulously avoided.

There was a Care on my Mind so to pass my Time, that nothing might hinder me from the most steady Attention to the Voice of the true Shepherd.

The observed worker should be made to realize the purpose and importance of the measurement. The observing should always be done with his full knowledge and hearty coöperation.

For death also is one piece of the business of life, and, here as elsewhere, it is enough to do well what comes to our hand.

Bear toil and pain, not as if wretched under it, nor as courting pity or admiration.

No man can hinder the proper work of the mind.

Shirking responsibility has never been a fault with which colored women might be truthfully charged.

I had, and still have, determined perseverance, but I soon found that it was in vain to occupy my mind beyond a certain time.

Every effort under compulsion demands a sacrifice of life-energy.

Free trade in labour and equality of training, intellectual or physical, is essential if the organic aptitudes of a sex or class are to be determined.

The past material conditions of life have gone for ever; no will of man can recall them.

We demand nothing more than this, and we will take nothing less.

The ultimate effect of parasitism is always a paralysis of the will and an inability to compel oneself into any course of action for the moment unpleasurable and exhaustive.

success is the child of drudgery and perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price, and it is yours.

If you’re going to do a job, do it right.

All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, have done good work, although they may die before they have the time to sign it.

They meant that public officers should owe their whole service to the Government and to the people.

What is done in business must be well done; for it is better to accomplish perfectly a small amount of work, than to half-do ten times as much.

Failure in any good cause is, however, honourable, whilst success in any bad cause is merely infamous.

A man's life is to be measured by what he does in it, and what he feels in it.

Watch a man do his most common actions; those are indeed the things which will tell you the real character of a great man.

Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different.