31 verified quotes from 22 writers, c. AD 180 to 1923.
Quotes 17 to 31 of 31, page 2 of 2.
Continued from page 1, which has our introduction. Still oldest first.
What “verified” means, and what we leave out: How we verify.
"Begin at the beginning," the King said gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop."
Our note: The King's instructions to the White Rabbit at the trial.
Verified in the full text of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #11
Painted the same decade: Young Lady in 1866, Edouard Manet, 1866
He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it—namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain.
Our note: After Tom tricks his friends into paying him for the chance to whitewash a fence.
Verified in the full text of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #74
Painted the same decade: Joan of Arc, Jules Bastien-Lepage, 1879
…to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour.
Our note: The close of the short essay "El Dorado."
Verified in the full text of El Dorado on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #386 · Collected in Virginibus Puerisque, and Other Papers
Painted the same decade: By the Seashore, Auguste Renoir, 1883
Extreme busyness, whether at school or college, kirk or market, is a symptom of deficient vitality; …
Our note: From Stevenson's essay defending leisure.
Verified in the full text of An Apology for Idlers on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #386 · Collected in Virginibus Puerisque, and Other Papers
Painted the same decade: Study for "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte", Georges Seurat, 1884
By all means begin your folio; even if the doctor does not give you a year, even if he hesitates about a month, make one brave push and see what can be accomplished in a week
Our note: The same essay: start the big work anyway.
Verified in the full text of Æs Triplex on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #386 · Collected in Virginibus Puerisque, and Other Papers
Painted the same decade: Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat (obverse: The Potato Peeler), Vincent van Gogh, 1887
…three hours a day will produce as much as a man ought to write.
Our note: Trollope on his steady writing habit, kept up alongside a full-time post office career.
Verified in the full text of An Autobiography on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #5978
Painted the same decade: Shoes, Vincent van Gogh, 1888
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do
Our note: A humorist on why rest is sweetest when it interrupts something.
Verified in the full text of On Being Idle on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #849 · Collected in Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow
Painted the same decade: Shoes, Vincent van Gogh, 1888
I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.
Our note: The narrator's cheerful confession of laziness.
Verified in the full text of Three Men in a Boat on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #308
Painted the same decade: Wheat Field with Cypresses, Vincent van Gogh, 1889
The excellence of every art is its intensity
Our note: From Keats's letter of December 1817 to his brothers, a thought about what makes art work.
Verified in the full text of Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #35698
Painted the same decade: The Englishman (William Tom Warrener, 1861–1934) at the Moulin Rouge, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, 1892
No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem
Our note: From the 1895 Atlanta address, which Washington reprints in his autobiography.
Verified in the full text of Up from Slavery on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #2376
It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top.
Our note: From Washington's 1895 Atlanta Exposition address, which Up from Slavery reprints.
Verified in the full text of Up from Slavery on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #2376
This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one
Our note: From Shaw's 'Epistle Dedicatory' to the play.
Verified in the full text of Man and Superman on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #3328
The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home.
Our note: The first sentence of the book, just before the Mole gives up and runs outside into the spring.
Verified in the full text of The Wind in the Willows on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #289
Oh, these vast, calm, measureless mountain days, inciting at once to work and rest!
Our note: Another entry from the same journal.
Verified in the full text of My First Summer in the Sierra on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #32540
Painted the same decade: Tilla Durieux (Ottilie Godeffroy, 1880–1971), Auguste Renoir, 1914
Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.
Our note: From "On Work." The book is a series of answers given by the prophet Almustafa.
Verified in the full text of The Prophet on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #58585
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