Quotes About Persistence

History isn't like that. History unravels gently, like an old sweater. It has been patched and darned many times, reknitted to suit different people, shoved in a box under the sink of censorship to be cut up for the dusters of propaganda, yet it always - eventually - manages to spring back into its old familar shape. History has a habit of changing the people who think they are changing it. History always has a few tricks up its frayed sleeve. It's been around a long time.

The turtle moves.

Gravity is a habit that is hard to shake off.

The trouble with thinking was that, once you started, you went on doing it.

I think, he said, I think, if you want thousands, you have to fight for one.

No matter what she did with her hair it took about three minutes for it to tangle itself up again, like a garden hosepipe in a shed [Which, no matter how carefully coiled, will always uncoil overnight and tie the lawnmower to the bicycles].

Magic never dies. It merely fades away.

It is well known that a vital ingredient of success is not knowing that what you're attempting can't be done. A person ignorant of the possibility of failure can be a half-brick in the path of the bicycle of history.

Now ... if you trust in yourself ... and believe in your dreams ... and follow your star ... you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy. Goodbye.

Vimes had got around to a Clean Desk policy. It was a Clean Floor strategy that eluded him at the moment.

Miss Tick sniffed. 'You could say this advice is priceless,' she said. 'Are you listening?' 'Yes,' said Tiffany. 'Good. Now ... if you trust in yourself ...' 'Yes?' '... and believe in your dreams ...' 'Yes?' '... and follow your star ...' Miss Tick went on. 'Yes?' '... you'll still get beaten by people who spent THEIR time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy. Goodbye.

Y]ou weren't born with a talent for witchcraft: it didn't come easily; you worked hard at it because you wanted it. You forced the world to give it to you, no matter the price, and the price is and always will be high... People say you don't find witchcraft; witchcraft finds you. But you've found it, even if at the time you didn't know what it was you were finding, and you grabbed it by its scrawny neck and made it work for you.

The second mouse gets the cheese!

For example, the dwarfs found out how to turn lead into gold by doing it the hard way. The difference between that and the easy way is that the hard way works.

He wondered what kind of life it would be, having to keep swimming all the time to stay exactly in the same place. Pretty similar to his own, he decided.

EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS, STAYS HAPPENED. What kind of philosophy is that? THE ONLY ONE THAT WORKS.

Royalty was like dandelions. No matter how many heads you chopped off, the roots were still there underground, waiting to spring up again. It seemed to be a chronic disease. It was as if even the most intelligent person had this little blank spot in their heads where someone had written: Kings. What a good idea. Whoever had created humanity had left in a major design flaw. It was its tendency to bend at the knees.

Vimes struggled to his feet, shook his head and set off after it. No thought was involved. It is the ancient instinct of terriers and policemen to chase anything that runs away.

Don't you *ever* let go? I haven't yet. Why? I suppose... because in this world, after everyone panics, there's always got to be someone to tip the wee out of the shoe.

Do not seek perfection. None exists. All we can do is strive.

Right! Right! You can get there! I can get there! You're a natural at counting to two! I'm a nat'ral at counting to two! If you can count to two, you can count to anything! If I can count to two, I can count to anything! And then the world is your mollusc! My mollusc! What's a mollusc?

Granny's implicit belief that everything should get out of her way extended to other witches, very tall trees and, on occasion, mountains.

A bad hunter chases, a good hunter waits.

The way to deal with an impossible task was to chop it down into a number of merely very difficult tasks, and break each one of them into a group of horribly hard tasks, and each of them into tricky jobs, and each of them...