Samuel Smiles Quotes

114 Sourced Quotes

It is observed at sea that men are never so much disposed to grumble and mutiny as when least employed. Hence an old captain, when there was nothing else to do, would issue the order to "scour the anchor.

Samuel Smiles
Home is the first and most important school of character. It is there that every human being receives his best moral training, or his worst; for it is there that he imbibes those principles of conduct which endure through manhood, and cease only with life.

Samuel Smiles
Purposes, like eggs, unless they be hatched into action, will run into rottenness.

Samuel Smiles
Conscience is that peculiar faculty of the soul which may be called the religious instinct.

Samuel Smiles
The life of a good man is at the same time the most eloquent lesson of virtue and the most severe reproof of vice.

Samuel Smiles
There is no act, however trivial, but has its train of consequences.

Samuel Smiles
A woman's best qualities do not reside in her intellect, but in her affections. She gives refreshment by her sympathies, rather than by her knowledge.

Samuel Smiles
The path of success in business is invariably the path of common-sense. Nothwithstanding all that is said about "lucky hits," the best kind of success in every man's life is not that which comes by accident. The only "good time coming" we are justified in hoping for is that which we are capable of making for ourselves.

Samuel Smiles
The Romans rightly employed the same word (virtus) to designate courage, which is, in a physical sense, what the other is in a moral; the highest virtue of all being victory over ourselves.

Samuel Smiles
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.

Samuel Smiles
Human knowledge is but an accumulation of small facts, made by successive generations of men, the little bits of knowledge and experience carefully treasured up by them growing at length into a mighty pyramid.

Samuel Smiles
The possession of a library, or the free use of it, no more constitutes learning, than the possession of wealth constitutes generosity.

Samuel Smiles
It is the close observation of little things which is the secret of success in business, in art, in science, and in every pursuit of life.

Samuel Smiles
Riches do not constitute any claim to distinction. It is only the vulgar who admire riches as riches.

Samuel Smiles
Great men are always exceptional men; and greatness itself is but comparative. Indeed, the range of most men in life is so limited that very few have the opportunity of being great.

Samuel Smiles
Men cannot be raised in masses as the mountains were in he early geological states of the world. They must be dealt with as units; for it is only by the elevation of individuals that the elevation of the masses can be effectively secured.

Samuel Smiles
Although genius always commands admiration, character most secures respect. The former is more the product of the brain, the latter of heart-power; and in the long run it is the heart that rules in life.

Samuel Smiles
Though an inheritance of acres may be bequeathed, an inheritance of knowledge and wisdom cannot. The wealthy man may pay others for doing his work for him; but it is impossible to get his thinking done for him by another, or to purchase any kind of self-culture.

Samuel Smiles
If we opened our minds to enjoyment, we might find tranquil pleasures spread about us on every side. We might live with the angels that visit us on every sunbeam, and sit with the fairies who wait on every flower.

Samuel Smiles
Riches are oftener an impediment than a stimulus to action; and in many cases they are quite as much a misfortune as a blessing.

Samuel Smiles
He who recognizes no higher logic than that of the shilling may become a very rich man, and yet remain all the while an exceedingly poor creature; for riches are no proof whatever of moral worth, and their glitter often serves only to draw attention to the worthlessness of their possessor, as the glow-worm's light reveals the grub.

Samuel Smiles
When typhus or cholera breaks out, they tell us that Nobody is to blame. That terrible Nobody! How much he has to answer for. More mischief is done by Nobody than by all the world besides.

Samuel Smiles
Luck lies in bed, and wishes the postman would bring him news of a legacy; labor turns out at six, and with busy pen or ringing hammer lays the foundation of a competence.

Samuel Smiles
There are many persons of whom it may be said that they have no other possession in the world but their character, and yet they stand as firmly upon it as any crowned king.

Samuel Smiles
The most influential of all the virtues are those which are the most in request for daily use. They wear the best, and last the longest.

Samuel Smiles
What we are accustomed to decry as great social evils, will, for the most part, be found to be only the out-growth of our own perverted life; and though we may endeavor to cut them down and extirpate them by means of law, they will only spring up again with fresh luxuriance in some other form, unless the conditions of human life and character are radically improved.

Samuel Smiles
Honorable industry always travels the same road with enjoyment and duty, and progress is altogether impossible without it.

Samuel Smiles
Commit a child to the care of a worthless, ignorant woman, and no culture in after-life will remedy the evil you have done.

Samuel Smiles
Those who have most to do, and are willing to work, will find the most time.

Samuel Smiles
Experience serves to prove that the worth and strength of a state depend far less upon the form of its institutions than upon the character of its men; for the nation is only the aggregate of individual conditions, and civilization itself is but a question of personal, improvement.

Samuel Smiles