Good Thoughts and Famous Quotations, Part 1

Good Thoughts

Compiled by Jayaram V

Love sought is good, but given unsought is better. Shapkepeare

There is no greater grief in misery than to turn our thoughts back to happier times. Dante

He who angers you conquers you. Elizabeth Kenny Australian Nurse

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.Ralph Waldo Emerson

Every moment that a man may be in want of employment, than such I hold him to be far better who is forced to labour for nothing. Afghan

Reason is captive in the hands of the passions, as a weak man in the hands of an artful woman. Sa’dī.

Begin somewhere. You cannot build a reputation on what you intend to do. Liz Smith

There are two lasting bequests we can give our children: One is roots. The other is wings. Hodding Carter, Jr.

If you can DREAM it, you can DO it.Walt Disney

Like an earthen pot, a bad man is easily broken, and cannot readily be restored to his former situation; but a virtuous man, like a vase of gold, is broken with difficulty, and easily repaired. Hitopadesa.

Success is that old ABC -- ability, breaks, and courage.-Charles Luckman

To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; to leave the world a little better; whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is the meaning of success. Ralph Waldo Emerson.

The son who delights his father by his good actions; the wife who seeks only her husband’s good; the friend who is the same in prosperity and adversity—these three things are the reward of virtue. Bhartrihari.

The doors we open and close each day decide the lives we live. Flora Whittemore

Labor rids us of three evils.—Tediousness, Vice and Poverty. —Carlyle.

"Never start upon an undertaking until you are sure it is practicable and ought to be done, and then let nothing stand long in the way of accomplishing that undertaking. It is better to deserve success than to have it; few deserve it who do not attain it." —Henry Clay.

There is no failure in this country for those whose personal habits are good, and who follow some honest calling industriously, unselfishly, and purely. If one desires to succeed, he must pay the price—work!" —Henry Clay.

Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. Shakespeare

In order to succeed, a man must have a purpose fixed, then let his motto be victory or death. —Henry Clay.

To abstain from speaking is regarded as very difficult. It is not possible to say much that is valuable and striking. Mahābhārata.

"Be liberal but cautious; enterprising but careful." —Henry Clay.

"Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall." —Henry Clay.

Nothing is more becoming a man than silence. It is not the preaching but the practice which ought to be considered as the more important. A profusion of words is sure to lead to error. Talmud.

Fail!—Fail? In the lexicon of youth, which Fate reserves for a bright manhood, there is no such word As—fail! —"Richelieu."

Benjamin Franklin has truly said: The road to wealth is as plain as the road to mill.

The friendship of the bad is like the shade of some precipitous bank with crumbling sides, which, falling, buries him who is beneath. Bhāravi.

He is not dead who departs this life with high fame; dead is he, though living, whose brow is branded with infamy. Tieck.

Men are of three different capacities: one understands intuitively; another understands so far as it is explained; and a third understands neither of himself nor by explanation. The first is excellent, the second, commendable, and the third, altogether useless. Machiavelli.

It is difficult to understand men, but still harder to know them thoroughly. Schiller.

Through avarice a man loses his understanding, and by his thirst for wealth he gives pain to the inhabitants of both worlds. Hitopadesa.

This world is a beautiful book, but of little use to him who cannot read it. Goldoni.

The path of glory leads but to the grave.—Gray.

The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfected without trials. Chinese.

Good fortune is a benefit to the wise, but a curse to the foolish. Chinese.

Who aims at excellence will be above mediocrity; who aims at mediocrity will be far short of it. Burmese.

A wise man adapts himself to circumstances, as water shapes itself to the vessel that contains it. Chinese.

The greatest men sometimes overshoot themselves, but then their very mistakes are so many lessons of instruction. Tom Browne.

Ambition has but one reward for all: A little power, a little transient fame, A grave to rest in, and a fading name! —William Winter.

Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.—Longfellow.

Circumspection in calamity; mercy in greatness; good speeches in assemblies; fortitude in adversity: these are the self-attained perfections of great souls. Hitopadesa.

Ambition has but one reward for all: A little power, a little transient fame, A grave to rest in, and a fading name! —William Winter.

There are three whose life is no life: he who lives at another’s table; he whose wife domineers over him; and he who suffers bodily affliction. Talmud.

He is a fool who cannot be angry; but he is a wise man who will not.—Seneca.

An angry man opens his mouth and shuts up his eyes.—Cato.

Let thy words between two foes be such that if they were to become friends thou shouldst not be ashamed. Sa’dī.

When a man is wrong and won't admit it, he always gets angry.—Haliburton.

A good man’s intellect is piercing, yet inflicts no wound; his actions are deliberate, yet bold; his heart is warm, but never burns; his speech is eloquent, yet ever true. Māgha.

Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.—Ephesians 4:26.

Trees loaded with fruit are bent down; the clouds when charged with fresh rain hang down near the earth: even so good men are not uplifted through prosperity. Such is the natural character of the liberal. Bhartrihari.

Anger begins with folly and ends with repentance.—Pythagoras.

There is not half so much danger in the desperate sword of a known foe as in the smooth insinuations of a pretended friend. R. Chamberlain.

Anger causes us often to condemn in one what we approve of in another.—Pasquier Quesnel.

Contentment consisteth not in heaping more fuel, but in taking away some fire. Fuller.

There never was, there never will be, a man who is always praised, or a man who is always blamed. Dhammapada.

The perfection of art is to conceal art.—Quintilian

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