Effort quotes

Effort

3.6K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.

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Browse quotes that often appear alongside effort — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.

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Effort quotes (page 42 of 179)

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Samuel Johnson Lexicographer, Essayist, Critic
Effort

"He that compares what he has done with what he has left undone, will feel the effect which must always follow the comparison of imagination with reality; he will look with contempt on his own unimportance, and wonder to what purpose he came into the world; he will repine that he shall leave behind him no evidence of his having been, that he has added nothing to the system of life, but has glided from youth to age among the crowd, without any effort for distinction."

Reality Effort Imagination
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Samuel Johnson Lexicographer, Essayist, Critic
Effort

"That eminence of learning is not to be gained without labour, at least equal to that which any other kind of greatness can require, will be allowed by those who wish to elevate the character of a scholar; since they cannot but know that every human acquisition is valuable in proportion to the difficulty of its attainment."

Character Effort Greatness
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Samuel Johnson Lexicographer, Essayist, Critic
Effort

"No man can perform so little as not to have reason to congratulate himself on his merits, when he beholds the multitude that live in total idleness, and have never yet endeavoured to be useful."

Men Littles Effort
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Samuel Johnson Lexicographer, Essayist, Critic
Effort

"Many causes may vitiate a writer's judgement of his own works. On that which has cost him much labour he sets a high value, because he is unwilling to think that he has been diligent in vain: what has been produced without toilsome efforts is considered with delight as a proof of vigorous faculties and fertile invention; and the last work, whatever it be, has necessarily most of the grace of novelty."

Thinking Writing Effort
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Theo Rossi Actor
Effort

"For joy, I live by the mantra of surrounding yourself with people who make your life better... people who enhance your life and motivate you to be the best version of yourself. It's not always easy, but I've had to make a conscious effort to remove people who are a lot of work and drain my energy...you know, those energy suckers we each have in our lives."

People Joy Effort
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Thomas Jefferson Politician, Founding Father
Effort

"The great cause which divides our countries is not to be decided by individual animosities. The harmony of private societies cannot weaken national efforts."

Country Effort Friendship
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Thomas Jefferson Politician, Founding Father
Effort

"The reward of esteem, respect and gratitude [is] due to those who devote their time and efforts to render the youths of every successive age fit governors for the next."

Age Effort Gratitude
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Thomas Jefferson Politician, Founding Father
Effort

"I am myself an empiric in natural philosophy, suffering my faith to go no further than my facts. I am pleased, however, to see the efforts of hypothetical speculation, because by the collisions of different hypotheses, truth may be elicited and science advanced in the end."

Philosophy Suffering Effort
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Thomas Jefferson Politician, Founding Father
Effort

"A good cause is often injured more by ill-timed efforts of its friends than by the arguments of its enemies. Persuasion, perseverance and patience are the best advocates on questions depending on the will of others."

Effort Enemy Perseverance
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Thomas Merton Writer, Monk
Effort

"The things I thought were so important -- because of the effort I put into them -- have turned out to be of small value. And the things I never thought about, the things I was never able to either to measure or to expect, were the things that mattered."

Important Able Effort
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Tom Hanks Actor, Producer
Effort

"One thing that was amazing about World War II was that everybody signed up for the duration plus six months. Fliers got to leave combat after 25 missions, or 35 missions, but other than that, you were in it. You were part of the great effort, until, oh boy, six months after it was over."

War Boys Effort
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Tom Robbins Novelist, Essayist
Effort

"The author isn't altogether certain that there is any such thing as exaggeration. Our brains permit us to use such a wee fraction of their resources that, in a sense, everything we experience is a reduction. We employ drugs, yoga techniques and poetics - and a thousand more clumsy methods - in an effort just to bring things back up to normal."

Effort Yoga Drug
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Seth Godin Author, Entrepreneur
Effort

"No one can be responsible for where or how we each begin. No one has the freedom to do anything or everything, and all choices bring consequences. What we choose to do next, though, how to spend our resources or attention or effort, this is what defines us."

Motivational Choices Effort
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Richard P. Feynman Physicist
Effort

"In its efforts to learn as much as possible about nature, modern physics has found that certain things can never be "known" with certainty. Much of our knowledge must always remain uncertain. The most we can know is in terms of probabilities."

Effort Modern Physics
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