Quotes from Orison Swett Marden

Do little things now, says a Persian proverb; so shall big things come to thee by and by asking to be done. God will take care of the great things if we do not neglect the little ones.

efficiency never has to go begging for advancement; the man that masters his trade goes to the front.

The true way to conquer circumstances is to be a greater circumstance yourself.

Read or Starve. Show me a man who has made fifty thousand dollars, and I will show you in that man an equivalent of energy, attention to detail, trustworthiness, punctuality, professional knowledge, good address, common sense, and other marketable qualities.

The discouraged have their backs turned toward the light, so that all the black shadows fall across their path.

If we wish to appeal to the best, if we wish to draw the best out of others, we must look for the best in them; we must think the best of them; we must trust them; we must believe in them. The man who smiles and sees the best in everything and everybody is the man who draws the best out of others. He attracts others and wins out in life, while the gloomy, sour face repels everyone.

This habit of reading, I make bold to tell you, says Trollope, is your pass to the greatest, the purest, and the most perfect pleasures that God has prepared for His creatures. Other pleasures may be more ecstatic; but the habit of reading is the only enjoyment I know, in which there is no alloy.

Where is the man who will save us? We want a man! Don't look so far for this man. You have him at hand. This man—it is you, it is I; it is each one of us!... How to constitute one's self a man? Nothing harder, if one knows not how to will it; nothing easier, if one wills it. —Alexander Dumas.

It is said that long livers are great hopers. If you keep your hope bright in spite of discouragements, and meet all difficulties with a cheerful face, it will be very difficult for age to trace its furrows on your brow. There is longevity in cheerfulness.

We are just beginning to see the wonderful scientific truth in the philosophy which tells us to love our enemies, because if we hate them we merely add more fuel to passion's fire, while love puts it out. The love thought neutralizes hatred, jealousy, and makes friends of our enemies. There is nothing in love which can make an enemy. The injunction to love our enemies is, therefore, as scientific as the advice to put out fire by water.

Hate seed in the heart cannot produce a love flower in the life. A sinister thought will produce a sinister harvest. The revenge seed will produce a bloody harvest.

It is a law of nature, said Herodotus, "that faint-hearted men should be the fruit of luxurious countries; for we never find that the same soil produces delicacies and heroes.

We try to grasp too much of life at once; since we think of it as a whole, instead of living one day at a time. Life is a mosaic, and each tiny piece must be cut and set with skill, first one piece, then another.

If a man purposely does me wrong," a Buddhist says, "I will return him my ungrudging love; the more evil comes from him, the more good shall go from me.

and if a straw can tickle a man, it is an instrument of happiness.

What would you do, if you were besieged in a place entirely destitute of provisions? As long as there was anything to eat in the enemy's camp, answered Napoleon, "I should not be at all concerned. A will finds a way.

Many a man would have been a success had ne connected his fragmentary efforts. Spasmodic, disconnected attempts, without concentration, uncontrolled by any fixed idea, will never bring success. It is continuity of purpose alone that achieves results.

No man can be great who allows himself to get angry.

He who would do some great thing in this short life must apply himself to the work with such a concentration of his forces as, to idle spectators, who live only to amuse themselves, looks like insanity.

to inspire his men, wont about among the plague-stricken soldiers, touching their wounds with his bare hands. He said that the man who had no fear would never be stricken with the plague. he believed that the mind is master of the body. If there was over a believer in the almost omnipotent power of the mind and of the will, it was Napoleon.

The gods sell anything and to everybody at a fair price.

The waste of life occasioned by trying to do too many things at once is appalling. No one is large enough to be split up into many parts; and the sooner a man can stamp this truth upon his mind, the better his chances for being a profitable member of society.

It is just as important to set apart time for the development of our aesthetic faculties as for cultivating the money-getting instinct. A man cannot live by bread alone. His higher life demands an impalpable food.

What is enthusiasm but a passionate belief in what seems to be a high and holy aim - an unselfish devotion to some noble cause - a consecration of heart and mind and soul to the attainment of a great object?