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My aim is to show that only an inappreciable fraction of our ordered and sustained efforts is given to the business of actual living, as distinguished from the preliminaries to living.

No man is so formed that he can be left entirely to himself, to go his own ways; everyone needs to be guided by a preconceived plan, and to follow certain general rules.

To have no regular work, no set sphere of activity--what a miserable thing it is!

Who does not see from all this that man has gone astray, that he has fallen from his place, that he seeks it with disquiet, that he cannot regain it?

Cast down your bucket where you are.

Be determined to get up, to reach the highest goal you have in view, and you will.

Your life will never be a straight path.

Our attempts to banish this importunate duty will only make it return upon us again and again, and every time in a shape more unpleasant than the former.

A man cannot deserve adventures; he cannot earn dragons and hippogriffs.

These young people have had advantages of college, of European travel, and of economic study, but they are sustaining this shock of inaction.

She is besotted with innocent little ambitions, and does not understand this apparent waste of herself, this elaborate preparation, if no work is provided for her.

Young people themselves often resent this attitude on the part of their elders; they feel set aside and belittled as if they were denied the common human experiences.

Huxley declares that the sense of uselessness is the severest shock which the human system can sustain, and that if persistently sustained, it results in atrophy of function.

At this my heart sank within me: the whole foundation on which my life was constructed fell down.

The end had ceased to charm, and how could there ever again be any interest in the means?

Is pleasure, then, the object of your being, and not action, and the exercise of your powers?

Make trial how the life of a good man succeeds with you, the life of one who is content with the lot appointed him by Providence

Find your sole delight and recreation in proceeding from one unselfish action to another, with God ever in mind.

Now the end, I take it, is all one, to live at more leisure and at one's ease: but men do not always take the right way.

The man who labors without a definite purpose that is backed up by a definite plan for its attainment, resembles the ship that has lost its rudder.

The time of such a man is always spent in forming schemes, which a change of wind hinders him from executing, his powers fume away in projects and in hope, and the day of action never arrives.

Life must needs be disgusting alike to the idle rich man as to the idle poor man, who has no work to do, or, having work, will not do it.

If to-day thou art not ready, how shalt thou be ready to-morrow?

There are but few important events in the affairs of men brought about by their own choice.

If a man knows the wherefore of his existence, then the manner of it can take care of itself.