Permanent success is oftener won by holding on than by sudden dash, however brilliant.

The easily discouraged, who are pushed back by a straw, are all the time dropping to the rear--to perish or to be carried along on the stretcher of charity.

They who understand and practice Abraham Lincoln's homely maxim of 'pegging away' have achieved the solidest success." It is better to deserve success than to merely have it; few deserve it who do not attain it.

There is no failure in this country for those whose personal habits are good, and who follow some honest calling industriously, unselfishly, and purely.

If one desires to succeed, he must pay the price, work.
No matter how weak a power may be, rational use will make it stronger.
No matter how awkward your movements may be, how obtuse your senses, or how crude your thought, or how unregulated your desires, you may by patient discipline acquire, slowly indeed but with infallible certainty, grace and freedom of action, clearness and acuteness of perception, strength and precision of thought, and moderation of desire.
It would go very far to destroy the absurd and pernicious association of genius and idleness, to show that the greatest poets, orators, statesmen, and historians--men of the most imposing and brilliant talents--have actually labored as hard as the makers of dictionaries and arrangers of indexes; and the most obvious reason why they have been superior to other men, is, that they have taken more pains.
Even the great genius, Lord Bacon, left large quantities of material entitled "Sudden thoughts set down for use." John Foster was an indefatigable worker.