Quotes about Effort

The fatted calf, the best Scotch, the hoedown could all have been his too, any time he asked for them except that he never thought to ask for them because he was too busy trying cheerlessly and religiously to earn them.

The other danger is that apologists put so much effort into what they do that they may end up not so much defending the faith because they believe it is true as believing the faith is true because they have worked so hard and long to defend it.

Allowing only ordinary ability and opportunity, we may explain success mainly by one word and that word is WORK! WORK!! WORK!!! WORK!!!! Not transient and fitful effort, but patient, enduring, honest, unremitting and indefatigable work into which the whole heart is put[...] There is no royal road to perfection.

If there is no struggle, there is no progress.

He who does not advance in perfection falls into imperfection. An unattended garden becomes full of weeds. Things do not remain the same by being left alone. White fences do not stay white; they gradually become gray and then black. There are no planes in the spiritual life. We go uphill or we go downhill. The moment we cease to row against the stream, the current carries us down river.

You must pay the price if you wish to secure the blessing.

We will receive not what we idly wish for but what we justly earn. Our rewards will always be in exact proportion to our service.

I wanted to be a ballet dancer. I was bad - I'm not very coordinated. But I always wished I could have been a dancer.

The gods help them that help themselves.

There is no such thing as failure. There are only results.

One that desires to excel should endeavor in those things that are in themselves most excellent.

Law without education is a dead letter. With education the needed law follows without effort and, of course, with power to execute itself indeed, it seems to execute itself.