A Quote by Samuel Smiles
Character is undergoing constant change, for better or for worse--either being elevated on the one hand, or degraded on the other.
Related Quotes
All political action aims at either preservation or change. When desiring to preserve, we wish to prevent a change for the worse; when desiring to change, we wish to bring about something better. All political action is then guided by some thought of better or worse.
Unless the company becomes obsessed with constant change for the better, gradual change for the worse usually goes unnoticed.
Life is a constant process of change, for better or worse.
Everyone in this world is dealt a different hand - some better, some worse than others - but what's more important is how you play that hand. This is what builds character. And with great character comes great reward.
Man is not made better by being degraded; he is seldom restrained from crime by harsh measures, except the principle of fear predominates in his character, and then he is never made radically better for its influence.
Man is not made better by being degraded; he is seldom restrained from crime by harsh measures, except the principle of fear predominates in his character; and then he is never made radically better for its influence.
What the expression is intended to mean, I think, is that there is a better and a worse element in the character of each individual, and that when the naturally better element controls the worse then the man is said to be "master of himself", as a term of praise. But when - as a result of bad upbringing or bad company one s better element is overpowered by the numerical superiority of one s worse impulses, then one is criticized for not being master of oneself and for lack of self control.
Why should anyone be afraid of change? What can take place without it? What can be more pleasing or more suitable to universal nature? Can you take your bath without the firewood undergoing a change? Can you eat without the food undergoing a change? And can anything useful be done without change? Don't you see that for you to change is just the same, and is equally necessary for universal nature?
It so happens that the world is undergoing a transformation to which no change that has yet occurred can be compared, either in scope or in rapidity.
I think that I am interested in the resonance between character drama and high stakes, either situational or political or social or other kind of elevated drama, and I tend to find that those things combust.
The world we live in will be either better or worse depending on whether we become better or worse.
Human beings were not well served by permanence or stasis. Obviously, if individuals were progressing, they were undergoing a series of presumably desirable alterations, but in a universe where flux is fundamental, it can be argued that even change for the worse is preferable to no change at all. Isn't fixity the hallmark of the living dead?.
Nothing in Man is either worse or better for being shared with the beasts.
Though my life is low, if my spirit looks upward habitually at an elevated angle, it is as if it were redeemed. When the desire to be better than we are is really sincere we are instantly elevated, and so far better already.
What is the most rigorous law of our being? Growth. No smallest atom of our moral, mental, or physical structure can stand still a year. It grows--it must grow smaller or larger, better or worse--it cannot stand still. In other words, we change--and must change, constantly, and keep on changing as long as we live. What, then, is the true Gospel of consistency? Change. Who is the really consistent man? The man who changes. Since change is the law of his being, he cannot be consistent if he's stuck in a rut.
War is, at first, the hope that one will be better off; next, the expectation that the other fellow will be worse off; then, the satisfaction that he isn't any better off; and, finally, the surprise at everyone's being worse off.
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