Quotes About Adversity

Do not show your wounded finger, for everything will knock up against it.

Great occasions do not make heroes or cowards; they simply unveil them to the eyes of men. Silently and imperceptibly, as we wake or sleep, we grow strong or weak; and at last some crisis shows what we have become.

(Adversity is) the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially free from admirers then.

From a fallen tree, all make kindling.

The virtue of prosperity is temperance; the virtue of adversity is fortitude, which in morals is the heroical virtue.

The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities.

No untroubled day has ever dawned for me.

Trouble will rain on those who are already wet.

They say a reasonable amount o' fleas is good for a dog - it keeps him from broodin' over bein' a dog mebbe.

Be willing to have it so; acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.

Fire tries gold, misfortune men.

The fiery trials through which we pass will light us down in honour or dishonour to the latest generation.

A wounded deer leaps the highest.

I have always been pushed by the negative.... The apparent failure of a play sends me back to my typewriter that very night, before the reviews are out. I am more compelled to get back to work than if I had a success.

For me life is a challenge. And it will be a challenge if I live to be a hundred or if I get to be a trillionaire.

To be thrown upon one's own resources is to be cast into the very lap of fortune, for our faculties then undergo a development and display an energy of which they were previously unsusceptible.

Every failure made me more confident. Because I wanted even more to achieve things, as revenge. To show that I could.

Adversity is, to me at least, a tonic and a bracer.

Difficulties should act as a tonic. They should spur us to greater exertion.

Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war.

Every calamity is a spur and valuable hint.

Treasure the memories of past misfortunes; they constitute our bank of fortitude.

Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.

I think there is this about the great troubles - they teach us the art of cheerfulness; whereas the small ones cultivate the industry of discontent.