Quotes about effort
page 4

“Nations have, in the past, concentrated all their efforts on the accomplishment of one great task, but this has been so in times of war only. During the World War, Germany and England and France lived for one purpose only - to win the war. To that purpose everything else was subordinated. Soviet Russia, for the first time in history, concentrated the whole strength of the nation in a peaceful effort to build, and not to destroy, to raise a backward country industrially and within a framework of socialism.”

Jawaharlal Nehru book Glimpses of World History

Glimpses of World History (1949)

Peace, Time, History, Country

“This Five Year Plan had been drawn up after the most careful thought and investigation. The whole country had been surveyed by scientists and engineers, and numerous experts had discussed the problem of fitting in one part of the programme into another. For, the real difficulty came in this fitting in… But Russia had one great advantage over the capitalist countries. Under capitalism all these activities are left to individual initiative and chance, and owing to competition there is waste of effort. There is no co-ordination between different producers or different sets of workers, except the chance co-ordination which arises in the buyers and sellers coming to the same market… The Soviet Government had the advantage of controlling all the different industries and activities in the whole Union, and so it could draw up and try to work a single co-ordinated plan in which every activity found its proper place. There would be no waste in this, except such waste as might come from errors of calculation or working, and even such errors could be rectified far sooner with a unified control than otherwise.”

Jawaharlal Nehru book Glimpses of World History

Glimpses of World History (1949)

Drawing, Chance, Country, Problem

“We realized in our hearts that we could not do much till conditions were radically changed-hence our overwhelming desire for independence-and yet the passion for progress filled us and the wish to emulate other countries which had gone so far ahead in many ways. We thought of the United States of America and even of some eastern countries which were forging ahead. But most of all we had the example of the Soviet Union which in two brief decades, full of war and civil strife and in the face of what appeared to be insurmountable difficulties, had made tremendous progress. Some were attracted to communism, others were not, but all were fascinated by the advance of the Soviet Union in education and culture and medical care and physical fitness and in the solution of the problem of nationalities-by the amazing and prodigious effort to create a new world out of the dregs of the old.”

Jawaharlal Nehru book The Discovery of India

The Discovery of India (1946)

Country, War, Heart, Communication

“Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear. It is partly the terror of the unknown and partly, as I have said, the wish to feel that you have a kind of elder brother who will stand by you in all your troubles and disputes. Fear is the basis of the whole thing – fear of the mysterious, fear of defeat, fear of death. Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts. Science can help us to get over this craven fear in which mankind has lived for so many generations. Science can teach us, and I think our own hearts can teach us, no longer to look around for imaginary supports, no longer to invent allies in the sky, but rather to look to our own efforts here below to make this world a fit place to live in, instead of the sort of place that the churches in all these centuries have made it.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

"Fear, the Foundation of Religion"
1920s, Why I Am Not a Christian (1927)

Religion, Understanding, Making love, Support

“After demonstrating the practicability of this method of transmission, the thought naturally occurred to me to use the earth as a conductor, thus dispensing with all wires. Whatever electricity may be, it is a fact that it behaves like an incompressible fluid, and the earth may be looked upon as an immense reservoir of electricity, which, I thought, could be disturbed effectively by a properly designed electrical machine. Accordingly, my next efforts were directed toward perfecting a special apparatus which would be highly effective in creating a disturbance of electricity in the earth.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

The Problem of Increasing Human Energy (1900)

Perfection, Nature

“It has been argued that the perfection of guns of great destructive power will stop warfare. So I myself thought for a long time, but now I believe this to be a profound mistake. Such developments will greatly modify, but not arrest it. On the contrary, I think that every new arm that is invented, every new departure that is made in this direction, merely invites new talent and skill, engages new effort, offers new incentive, and so only gives a fresh impetus to further development. Think of the discovery of gun-powder. Can we conceive of any more radical departure than was effected by this innovation? Let us imagine ourselves living in that period: would we not have thought then that warfare was at an end, when the armor of the knight became an object of ridicule, when bodily strength and skill, meaning so much before, became of comparatively little value? Yet gunpowder did not stop warfare: quite the opposite it acted as a most powerful incentive.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

The Problem of Increasing Human Energy (1900)

Imagination, Time, Perfection, Thinking

“For every person who perishes from the effects of a stimulant, at least a thousand die from the consequences of drinking impure water. This precious fluid, which daily infuses new life into us, is likewise the chief vehicle through which disease and death enter our bodies. The germs of destruction it conveys are enemies all the more terrible as they perform their fatal work unperceived. They seal our doom while we live and enjoy. The majority of people are so ignorant or careless in drinking water, and the consequences of this are so disastrous, that a philanthropist can scarcely use his efforts better than by endeavoring to enlighten those who are thus injuring themselves. By systematic purification and sterilization of the drinking water the human mass would be very considerably increased. It should be made a rigid rule which might be enforced by law to boil or to sterilize otherwise the drinking water in every household and public place. The mere filtering does not afford sufficient security against infection. All ice for internal uses should be artificially prepared from water thoroughly sterilized. The importance of eliminating germs of disease from the city water is generally recognized, but little is being done to improve the existing conditions, as no satisfactory method of sterilizing great quantities of water has yet been brought forward. By improved electrical appliances we are now enabled to produce ozone cheaply and in large amounts, and this ideal disinfectant seems to offer a happy solution of the important question.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

The Problem of Increasing Human Energy (1900)

Drink, Law, Question, Personality

“I would not be surprised if Martin Luther King and these agitators next desecrate the graves of Confederate soldiers and drag their remains through the streets in an effort to garner headlines. And what kind of person is participating in this march? Beatniks, frauds, and persons wanted to answer for crimes in other States.”

James Eastland (1904–1986) American politician

To the Senate about the Grenada, Mississippi civil rights movement, after activists put American flags on the place where a Confederate memorial stood. June 16, 1966 Congressional Records https://books.google.fr/books?id=TqUs5UlIPaUC&q=%22And+what+kind+of+person+is+participating+in+this%22&dq=%22And+what+kind+of+person+is+participating+in+this%22&hl=fr&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjw8NC1sb3kAhUgDmMBHbF7BogQ6AEIKzAA%7C 1960s

Personality, Fraud

“We call on the United Nations once again to uphold the principle of universality and its multilateral efforts toward total inclusion and to allow Taiwan to participate in relevant extensions on a dignified and equal footing.”

Mswati III (1968) King of Swaziland

Mswati III (2019) cited in: " Allies voice support for Taiwan's inclusion in U.N. activities http://focustaiwan.tw/news/aipl/201909260004.aspx" in Focus Taiwan, 26 September 2019. Statement made during the General Debate of the 74th general assembly of the United Nations, 25 September 2019.

Universe

“You listen and live prudently, in fact you do not live at all, but work and save and are burdened with cares; and so your whole life passes. Then, all of a sudden, the whole thing turns upside down; times come when the world mocks at reason, when the Church shuts its doors and is silent, when authority becomes mere brute force, when they who have made their money honestly and with the sweat of their brows lose both their time and their money, and the violent win the game. No one recognizes your efforts and there is no one to help or advise you how to keep what you have earned and saved. Can this be? Surely this cannot be?”

Ivo Andrič book The Bridge on the Drina

Source: The Bridge on the Drina (1945), Ch. 23

Money, Time, Game, Help

“Prejudice is not a failing peculiar to one race, it can and does exist in people of every race and ethnic background. It takes individual effort to root it out of one’s heart. In my case my father and mother saw that it never got a start. I shall be forever grateful to them.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

As quoted in "Ronald Reagan and Race" https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/ronald-reagan-and-race-richard-nixon-tape/ (August 2019), by Jay Nordlinger, National Review 1980s, First term of office (1981–1985)

People, Heart

“Ishta-devata and Guru are aids - very powerful aids on this path. But an aid to be effective requires your effort also. Your effort is a sine qua non.”

Ramana Maharshi (1879–1950) Indian religious leader

It is you who should see the sun. Can spectacles and the sun see for you? You yourself have to see your true nature. Not much aid is required for doing it!
Abide as the Self

“Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On the one hand the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think: every effort we can make to throw off our subjection, will serve but to demonstrate and confirm it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their empire: but in reality he will remain subject to it all the while. The principle of utility recognizes this subjection, and assumes it for the foundation of that system, the object of which is to rear the fabric of felicity by the hands of reason and of law. Systems which attempt to question it, deal in sounds instead of sense, in caprice instead of reason, in darkness instead of light.”

Jeremy Bentham book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation

Source: An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789; 1823), Ch. 1 : Of the Principle of Utility

Pain, Law, Question, Light

“Everything was a bigger struggle for me, everything required a bigger effort, so I understood that the sole basis for my future was discipline, and I maintain that discipline today, at 75...I mean, going out onstage to sing is an act of discipline and of absolute passion. Passion is natural, but discipline is willpower.”

Julio Iglesias (1943) Spanish recording artist; singer-songwriter

On how he credits discipline as the secret of his success in "Julio Iglesias reflects on a life that 'has been a miracle'" https://apnews.com/7ef030336a5b4a1a949723346d64ec51 in AP News (2019 Jun 14)

Singing, Future, Nature, Passion

“Tis true, I profess myself a Votary to Love — I acknowledge that a Lady is in the Case — and further I confess, that this Lady is known to you. — Yes Madam, as well as she is to one, who is too sensible of her Charms to deny the Power, whose Influence he feels and must ever Submit to. I feel the force of her amiable beauties in the recollection of a thousand tender passages that I coud wish to obliterate, till I am bid to revive them. — but experience alas! sadly reminds me how Impossible this is. — and evinces an Opinion which I have long entertaind, that there is a Destiny, which has the Sovereign controul of our Actions — not to be resisted by the strongest efforts of Human Nature.
You have drawn me my dear Madam, or rather have I drawn myself, into an honest confession of a Simple Fact — misconstrue not my meaning — ’tis obvious — doubt it not, nor expose it, — the World has no business to know the object of my Love, declard in this manner to — you when I want to conceal it — One thing, above all things in this World I wish to know, and only one person of your Acquaintance can solve me that, or guess my meaning.”

George Washington (1732–1799) first President of the United States

but adieu to this, till happier times, if I ever shall see them. Letter to https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-06-02-0013#GEWN-02-06-02-0013-fn-0002 Mrs. George William Fairfax (Sally Cary Fairfax) (12 September 1758) 1750s

Business, Personality, Beauty, Nature

“Now, more than any time in our history, we will be judged by our capacity for compassion. Our ability to come through this, won’t just be down to what government or businesses do, but by the individual acts of kindness that we show each other. The small business who does everything they can not to lay off their staff. The student who does a shop for their elderly neighbour. The retired nurse who volunteers to cover some shifts in their local hospital. When this is over, and it will be over, we want to look back on this moment and remember the many small acts of kindness done by us and to us. We want to look back on this time and remember how we thought first of others and acted with decency. We want to look back on this time and remember how, in the face of a generation-defining moment, we undertook a collective national effort - and we stood together. It’s on all of us.”

Rishi Sunak (1980) Chancellor of the Exchequer of the United Kingdom

Statement on the Coronavirus as Chancellor (20 March 2020) Instagram post @rishisunakmp https://www.instagram.com/p/B990ItXHhXW/ (21 March 2020) 2020

Business, Time, History

“On a personal note, I am grateful to have had opportunities to journey into space. It took nearly ten years to see my dreams come true. It was indeed worth the effort and the wait.”

Chiaki Mukai (1952) astronaut, medical doctor

And I strongly believe that "Education enables us to envision and to pursue our dreams." Source: Space and I, Chiaki Mukai http://www.globaleducationmagazine.com/space-and-i/

Personality, Dreams, Waiting

““Never despair. The darkest point of the night is the closest point to daylight. No success is achieved without effort, so fight for your goals and know that success is near.””

Alireza Kohany (1993) Musician, Actor, Entrepreneur

Source: https://knnit.com/lets-learn-the-story-of-alireza-kohanys-life-and-the-bridge-he-built-from-failure-to-success/

Despair, Night, Success, Fight

“Don't love someone because of what they gives you, but the efforts they're making in your life”

Dr. Manuel

Love, Life

“A hobby accompanied by more effort on your part, will result in a great career.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Parting

“Ignorance is not everlasting…
To overcome it, one must make an effort.
Educating yourself is mandatory…
you are malleable!
To be honest…who wants to be in this type of bliss?”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Education

“Credulity [...] is not a crime, but it becomes criminal by resisting conviction. It is strangling in the womb of the conscience the efforts it makes to ascertain truth. We should never force belief upon ourselves in any thing.”

Thomas Paine book The Age of Reason

1790s, The Age of Reason, Part II (1795), The New Testament

Truth

“A person should set his goals as early as he can and devote all his energy and talent to getting there. With enough effort, he may achieve it. Or he may find something that is even more rewarding. But in the end, no matter what the outcome, he will know he has been alive.”

Walt Disney (1901–1966) American film producer and businessman

As quoted in Walt Disney, Magician of the Movies (1966) by Bob Thomas p. 116

Personality

“Nature herself, indeed, seems to have given music to us as a benefit, to enable us to endure labors with greater facility, for musical sounds cheer even the rower; and it is not only in those works in which the efforts of many, while some pleasing voice leads them, conspire together that music is of avail, but the toil even of people at work by themselves finds itself soothed by song, however rude.”

Quintilian (35–96) ancient Roman rhetor

H. E. Butler's translation:
Indeed nature itself seems to have given music as a boon to men to lighten the strain of labour: even the rower in the galleys is cheered to effort by song. Nor is this function of music confined to cases where the efforts of a number are given union by the sound of some sweet voice that sets the tune, but even solitary workers find solace at their toil in artless song.
Book I, Chapter X, 16
De Institutione Oratoria (c. 95 AD)
Original: (la) Atque eam natura ipsa videtur ad tolerandos facilius labores velut muneri nobis dedisse, si quidem et remigem cantus hortatur; nec solum in iis operibus in quibus plurium conatus praeeunte aliqua iucunda voce conspirat, sed etiam singulorum fatigatio quamlibet se rudi modulatione solatur.

People, Nature, Music

“The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in myriad petty little unsexy ways, every day.”

David Foster Wallace (1962–2008) American fiction writer and essayist

Essays
Source: Kenyon College Commencement Speech, April 21, 2005, published as This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life.

People, Way, Freedom

“People can do great things. However, there are some things they just CAN'T do. I, for instance, have not been able to transform myself into a Popsicle, despite years of effort.”

Brandon Sanderson Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

Source: Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

People

“Effort only fully releases its reward after a person refuses to quit.”

Napoleon Hill (1883–1970) American author

Business, Personality

“The only thing you can do easily is be wrong, and that's hardly worth the effort.”

Norton Juster book The Phantom Tollbooth

Source: The Phantom Tollbooth

“To be sensual, I think, is to respect and rejoice in the force of life, of life itself, and to bein all that one does, from the effort of loving to the breaking of bread.”

James Baldwin book The Fire Next Time

Source: The Fire Next Time

Love, Life, Thinking

“I remember everything about it—with an effort. I see it all, as divers see what is going on above them, through a medium, dense, rippling, but transparent.”

J. Sheridan Le Fanu book Carmilla

Source: Carmilla

“I'm not a person who thinks they can have it all, but I certainly feel that with a bit of effort and guile I should be able to have more than my fair share.”

George Carlin When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?

Source: When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?

Feeling, Thinking, Personality

“If only Paris and the Harpies had gotten along. But Promiscuity had taken one look at the beautiful women and deemed them “too much effort.”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

Source: The Darkest Whisper

Women, Beauty

“Whether consciousness is implanted in us by something divine, or whether it is created by the efforts of our brains, the end result is the same. We are.”

Neal Shusterman (1962) American novelist

Source: UnWholly

“Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom. It is the result of long and patient effort in self-control. Its presence is an indication of ripened experience, and of a more than ordinary knowledge of the laws and operations of thought.”

James Allen book As a Man Thinketh

As A Man Thinketh (1902), Serenity
Source: As a Man Thinketh

Wisdom, Law, Beauty, Knowledge

“For with slight efforts how should we obtain great results? It is foolish even to desire it.”

Euripidés (-480–-406 BC) ancient Athenian playwright

“Then he made one last effort to search in his heart for the place where his affection had rotted away, and he could not find it.”

Gabriel García Márquez book One Hundred Years of Solitude

Source: One Hundred Years of Solitude

Search, Heart

“Booze takes a lot of time and effort if you're going to do a good job with it.”

Raymond Carver (1938–1988) American short story author and poet

Source: Where I'm Calling From: New and Selected Stories

Time

“Those three things - autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward - are, most people will agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.”

Malcolm Gladwell (1963) journalist and science writer

Source: Outliers: The Story of Success

People

“Basically, your fear is like a mall cop who thinks he’s a Navy SEAL: He hasn’t slept in days, he’s all hopped up on Red Bull, and he’s liable to shoot at his own shadow in an absurd effort to keep everyone “safe.”

Elizabeth Gilbert Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear

Source: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear

Fear, Thinking

“By the time Alec came back into the training room, Jace was lying on the floor, envisioning lines of dancing girls in an effort to ignore the pain in his wrists. It wasn’t working.
~pg. 317~”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Source: City of Ashes

Pain, Girl, Lying, Time

“Life is sometimes novel-shaped, mocking the efforts of those authors who, in an effort to make their novels life-shaped, spurn the easy symmetry and cheap resonance of reality.”

Stephen Fry book Moab Is My Washpot

Source: Moab Is My Washpot

Life, Reality

“Be kind. It's worthwhile to make an effort to learn about other people and figure out what you might have in common with them.”

Viggo Mortensen (1958) American actor

People, Learning

“The greatest products of architecture are less the works of individuals than of society; rather the offspring of a nation's effort, than the inspired flash of a man of genius…”

Victor Hugo book The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Source: The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

“All that effort,” he mused, “merely to avoid me. How gratifying.”

Shana Abe U.S. American novelist

Source: The Smoke Thief

“…she was one of those happily created beings who please without effort, make friends everywhere, and take life so gracefully and easily that less fortunate souls are tempted to believe that such are born under a lucky star.”

Louisa May Alcott book Little Women

Source: Little Women

Life, Soul, Star

“Grace is the power of the Holy Spirit coming to us free of charge to enable you to do with ease what you could never do on your own with any amount of struggle and effort.”

Joyce Meyer (1943) American author and speaker

“I’ve seen all I need to. I’m going to go drink now in a futile effort to wipe away the memory of this debacle.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: Succubus Revealed

Drink, Memory

“Religion is a conceited effort to deny the most obvious realities.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

Religion, Reality

“Find a judo solution, one that delivers maximum efficiency with minimum effort. When good enough gets the job done, go for it.”

Jason Fried software entrepreneur

Source: Rework

“I am here for a purpose and that purpose is to grow into a mountain, not to shrink to a grain of sand. Henceforth will I apply ALL my efforts to become the highest mountain of all and I will strain my potential until it cries for mercy.”

Og Mandino (1923–1996) American author

Source: The Greatest Salesman in the World (2001): 2001 Gift Edition

Mountain

“Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of intelligent effort. There must be the will to produce a superior thing.”

John Ruskin (1819–1900) English writer and art critic

Intelligence

“It's not that we fear the place of darkness, but that we don't think we are worth the effort to find the place of light.”

Hugh Prather (1938–2010) American writer

Source: Notes to Myself: My Struggle to Become a Person

Fear, Thinking, Light

“There's an awful lot of inactive kindness which is nothing but laziness, not wanting any trouble, confusion, or effort.”

John Steinbeck book The Winter of Our Discontent

Source: The Winter of Our Discontent

“Theology — An effort to explain the unknowable by putting it into terms of the not worth knowing.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

1940s–present, A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949)

“There is no single effort more radical in its potential for saving the world than a transformation of the way we raise our children.”

Marianne Williamson (1952) American writer

Children, World, Way

“When he says we’re forgiven, let’s unload the guilt. When he says we’re valuable, let’s believe him…. When he says we’re provided for, let’s stop worrying. God’s efforts are strongest when our efforts are useless”

Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer

Source: Grace for the Moment: Inspirational Thoughts for Each Day of the Year

God

“Despite my best efforts, I'm not quite perfect. Let's just say I'm like one of those Hopi blankets where they leave a tiny flaw so as to not affront the Lord.”

Jen Lancaster (1967) American writer

Source: Bitter Is the New Black: Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass, Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office

Perfection

“I hold a beast, an angel, and a madman in me, and my enquiry is as to their working, and my problem is their subjugation and victory, down throw and upheaval, and my effort is their self-expression.”

Dylan Thomas (1914–1953) Welsh poet and writer

Angels, Problem, Victory

“Only in death will we have our own names since only in death are we no longer part of the effort. In death we become heroes.”

Chuck Palahniuk Fight Club

Source: Fight Club

Death, Parting

“Honestly I don't know why i have these parties"

"Because of your cat"

"That's true. Chairman Meow deserves my every effort”

Cassandra Clare book City of Bones

Source: City of Bones

Cats

“To be an artist includes much; one must possess many gift -absolute gifts- which have not been acquired by one's effort. And, moreover, to succeed, the artist must possess the courageous soul.”

Kate Chopin book The Awakening

Source: The Awakening

Soul, Courage

“The aim of poetry and the poet is finally to be of service, to ply the effort of the individual into the larger work of the community as a whole.”

Seamus Heaney (1939–2013) Irish poet, playwright, translator, lecturer

Communication

“Our emotions
Are only “incidents”
In the effort to keep day and night together.”

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965) 20th century English author

Night

“Why do you think the old stories tell of men who set out on great journeys to impress the gods? Because trying to impress people just isn't worth the time and effort.”

Henry Rollins (1961) American singer-songwriter

Men, God, People, Thinking

“From the philosopher Catulus, never to be dismissive of a friend's accusation, even if it seems unreasonable, but to make every effort to restore the relationship to its normal condition.”

Marcus Aurelius book Meditations

Source: Meditations

“How many a man has thrown up his hands at a time when a little more effort, a little more patience would have achieved success?”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

Time, Success, Patience

“All efforts to make politics aesthetic culminate in one thing, war.”

Walter Benjamin (1892–1940) German literary critic, philosopher and social critic (1892-1940)

War

“Respect your efforts, respect yourself. Self-respect leads to
self-discipline. When you have both firmly under your belt,
that's real power.”

Clint Eastwood (1930) actor and director from the United States

“A drowning man cannot be saved until he is utterly exhausted and ceases to make the slightest effort to save himself.”

Watchman Nee book The Normal Christian Life

Source: The Normal Christian Life

“Thus men will lie on their backs, talking about the fall of man, and never make an effort to get up.”

Henry David Thoreau book Life Without Principle

Source: Life Without Principle

Men, Lie

“Art never responds to the wish to make it democratic; it is not for everybody; it is only for those who are willing to undergo the effort needed to understand it.”

Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American novelist, short story writer

Source: Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose

Art, Understanding

“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963)
Context: I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in Texas. He writes: "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

Men, God, Hate, People

“Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Source: Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

“Constant effort and frequent mistakes are the stepping stones to genius.”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

Source: The Philosophy of Elbert Hubbard

“Be authentic. Don't try to be someone you aren't. You'll hate yourself for it & the effort to maintain the facade will exhaust you. BE REAL! Many won't like the real you but that's better than having people adore the person that isn't you at all”

Larry Winget (1952) American motivational speaker

Hate, People, Personality

“There must exist a paradigm, a practical model for social change that includes an understanding of ways to transform consciousness that are linked to efforts to transform structures.”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist

Source: Killing Rage: Ending Racism

Way, Understanding, Change

“Perhaps the time has come to cease calling it the 'environmentalist' view, as though it were a lobbying effort outside the mainstream of human activity, and to start calling it the real-world view.”

Edward O. Wilson (1929) American biologist

World, Time

“What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.”

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) English writer

First attributed to Johnson 15 years posthumously in a footnote in William Seward's Biographiana (1799), but written in slightly different form in 1764, in a profile in The Scots Magazine of Charles Churchill. The Scots Magazine, Volume 26 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=y14AAAAAYAAJ&q=%22without+effort%22&redir_esc=y&hl=en#v=snippet&q=%22without%20effort%22&f=false Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/11/08/without-effort/, retrieved 17 May 2016 Misattributed Source: Johnsonian Miscellanies - Vol II

Pleasure, Reading

“When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing.”

Enrique Jardiel Poncela (1902–1952) Spanish dramatist

Reading

“A poem…begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It is a reaching-out toward expression; an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion finds the thought and the thought finds the words.”

Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet

Letter to Louis Untermeyer (1 January 1916)
1910s

Sense

“I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.”

Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) Dutch philosopher

Understanding

“The imagination is the goal of history. I see culture as an effort to literally realize our collective dreams.”

Terence McKenna (1946–2000) American ethnobotanist

Dreams, Imagination, History

“Perception was easily accomplished, required little effort, and it never had to stand the test of reality.”

Terry Goodkind book Soul of the Fire

Source: Soul of the Fire

Reality

“Toleration … is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle.”

Helen Keller book The Story of My Life

Part III, Ch. 2: Personality http://books.google.com/books?id=zev1dMhB7C4C&q=Toleration+&quot;is+the+greatest+gift+of+the+mind+it+requires+the+same+effort+of+the+brain+that+it+takes+to+balance+oneself+on+a+bicycle&quot;&pg=PA295#v=onepage The Story of My Life (1903)

Wise

“There is some wisdom in taking a gloomy view, in looking upon the world as a kind of Hell, and in confining one's efforts to securing a little room that shall not be exposed to the fire.”

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German philosopher

Source: The Wisdom of Life and Counsels and Maxims

Wisdom, World, Hell

“The study of truth requires a considerable effort - which is why few are willing to undertake it out of love of knowledge - despite the fact that God has implanted a natural appetite for such knowledge in the minds of men.”

Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican scholastic philosopher of the Roman Catholic Church

Source: Summa Contra Gentiles

Love, Men, God, Truth

“I don’t expect perfection, I expect excellence.” I expect 100 percent effort in all you do.”

Steven D. Levitt (1967) American economist

When to Rob a Bank: ...And 131 More Warped Suggestions and Well-Intended Rants

Perfection

“The Yogic scriptures say that God responds to the sacred prayers and efforts of human beings in any way whatsoever that mortals choose to worship - just so long as those prayers are sincere.”

Elizabeth Gilbert (1969) American writer

God, Way, Sincerity

“Everyone has their weak spot. The one thing that despite your best efforts, will always bring you to your knees, regardless of how strong you are otherwise. For some people, it's love. Others, money or alcohol. Mine was even worse: calculus.”

Sarah Dessen Lock and Key

Source: Lock and Key

Love, Money, People, Alcohol

“It's me," said Jace. "Watching me play Scrabble is enough to make most women swoon. Imagine if I actually put in some effort.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Variant: It’s me,” said Jace. “Watching me play Scrabble is enough to make most women swoon. Imagine if I actually put in some effort.
Source: City of Lost Souls

Women, Imagination