Work and Profession

Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.

Intellectual ''work'' is misnamed; it is a pleasure, a dissipation, and is its own highest reward.

A reputable lawyer will advise you to keep out of the law, make the best of a foolish bargain, and not get caught again.

The law of work seems unfair, but nothing can change it; the more enjoyment you get out of your work, the more money you will make .

The bane of Americans is overwork-and the ruin of any work is a divided interest. Concentrate-concentrate. One thing at a time .

Write without pay until somebody offers to pay.

The primary rule of business success is loyalty to your employer. That's all right as a theory. What is the matter with loyalty to yourself?

There are two things nobody should ever have to watch being made, sausage and laws.

Let us be grateful to Adam: he cut us out of the blessing of idleness and won for us the curse of labor.

The most successful people are those who do all year long what they would otherwise do on their summer vacation .

The machine has several virtues... One may lean back in his chair and work it. It piles an awful stack of words on one page. It don't muss things or scatter ink blots around .

If work were so pleasant, the rich would keep it for themselves.

Never put off until tomorrow what you can avoid altogether. A clean desk is a sign of a cluttered desk drawer. All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure.

Work is a necessary evil to be avoided.

What work I have done I have done because it has been play. If it had been work I shouldn't have done it.

Literature is well enough, as a time-passer, and for the improvement and general elevation and purification of mankind, but it has no practical value.

God cures and the doctor sends the bill.

Do something everyday that you don't want to do.

So I became a newspaperman. I hated to do it but I couldn't find honest employment.

He charged nothing for his preaching and it was worth it too.

Unused talents gives you no advantage over someone who has no talent at all.

If it's your job to eat a frog, it's best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it's your job to eat two frogs, it's best to eat the biggest one first.

Work and play are words used to describe the same thing under differing conditions.

The less a man knows the bigger the noise he makes and the higher the salary he commands.