Character and Conduct – 12 February – Endurance

‘A SOMEWHAT varied experience of men has led me, the longer I live,’ said Huxley, ‘to set less value on mere cleverness;  to attach more and more importance to industry and physical endurance.   Indeed, I am much disposed to think that endurance is the most valuable quality of all;  for industry, as the desire to work hard, does not come to much if a feeble frame is unable to respond to the desire.   No life is wasted unless it ends in sloth, dishonesty, or cowardice.   No success is worthy of the name unless it is won by honest industry and brave breasting of the waves of fortune.’

OF all work producing results, nine-tenths must be drudgery.   There is no work, from the highest to the lowest, which can be done well by any man who is unwilling to make that sacrifice.   Part of the very nobility of the devotion of the true workman to his work consists in the fact that a man is not daunted by finding that drudgery must be done, and no man can really succeed in any walk of life without a good deal of what in ordinary English is called pluck.   That is the condition of all success, and there is nothing which so truly repays itself as this perseverance against weariness.

Bishop PHILPOTTS

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These quotes are from ‘Character and Conduct’ A selection of helpful thoughts from various authors arranged for daily reading.

Collected by Constance M Whishaw and first published in 1905 as a follow up to her volume of Daily Readings for members of the Being and Doing Guild who asked for an additional volume

In her preface Whishaw writes:

‘This collection of noble thoughts expressed by men and women of past and present ages who have endeavoured to leave the world a little better than they found it.’

It is my hope in publishing the her readers may be inspired to imitate the example of the authors.