Toil quotes
179 quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside toil — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till."
"The mischief of flattery is, not that it persuades any man that he is what he is not, but that it suppresses the influence of honest ambition, by raising an opinion that honour may be gained without the toil of merit."
"Much must he toil who serves the Immortal Gods."
"Whilst we strive To live most free, we're caught in our own toils."
"No one can become rich by the efforts of only their toil, but only by the discovery of some method of taxing the labor of others."
"Beware the toils of war ... the mesh of the huge dragnet sweeping up the world."
"The labor of keeping house is labor in its most naked state, for labor is toil that never finishes, toil that has to be begun again the moment it is completed, toil that is destroyed and consumed by the life process"
"Toil, says the proverb, is the sire of fame."
"When I come to be united to thee with all my being, then there will be no more pain and toil for me, and my life shall be a real life, being wholly filled by thee."
"Success, remember is the reward of toil."
"The true wealth of a state consists in the number of its inhabitants, in their toil and industry."
"As a beast of toil an ox is fixed capital. If he is eaten, he no longer functions as an instrument of labour, nor as fixed capital either."
"If ever there was a cause, if ever there can be a cause, worthy to be upheld by all of toil or sacrifice that the human heart can endure, it is the cause of Education."
"I am the laziest man in the world. I invented all those things to save myself from toil."
"Is it not certain that the Creator yawns in earthquake and thunder and other popular displays, but toils in rounding the delicate spiral of a shell? -Yeats, The Trembling of the Veil"
"Man was not put on this planet to toil in the mud. Or the god who put us on this planet to toil in the mud is no god I want to have any part of. It's some kind of gnostic demon. It's some kind of cannibalistic demiurge that should be thoroughly renounced and rejected."
"Better to toil blindly, beating every stone in turn for grains of gold, whether they contain any or not, than lie down in apathetic decay."
"I had no time to hate, because The grave would hinder me, And life was not so ample I Could finish enmity Nor had I time to love: but since Some industry must be, The little toil of love, I thought, Was large enough for me."
"Death hath a fairer fame than a life of toil."
"Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep."
