The difficulties, hardships and trials of life, the obstacles... are positive blessings. They knit the muscles more firmly, and teach self-reliance. — William Matthews Copy Share Image
The petty cares, the minute anxieties, the infinite littles which go to make up the sum of human experience, like the invisible granules of… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
Talking, is a digestive process which is absolutely essential to the mental constitution of the man who devours many books. — William Matthews Copy Share Image
Criminals are opportunists. If you've got a booming market, they're going to get away with more fraud. — William Matthews Copy Share Image
Intercourse is after all man's best teacher. "Know thyself" is an excellent maxim; but even self-knowledge cannot be perfected in closets and cloisters--nor amid… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
Stoutly as we may affirm that our disasters and vices are chargeable to luck, we never dream of ascribing our meritorious deeds, in the slightest degree to its agency. In such cases we quite unconsciously blink out of sight the magic power of the latter principle, so wondrous and all-controlling in its influence at other times, and coolly appropriate to… — William Matthews Copy Share
There is one curious fact noticeable in regard to this thing called "luck," which is, that while it is made responsible for any turn… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
There is a wide difference between general acquaintance and companionship. You may salute a man and exchange compliments with him daily, yet know nothing… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
One wellcultivated talent, deepened and enlarged, is worth 100 shallow faculties. The first law of success in this day, when so many things are… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
The same disappointments in life will chasten and refine one man's spirit, embitter another's. — William Matthews Copy Share Image
As frost, raised to its utmost intensity, produces the sensation of fire, so any good quality, overwrought and pushed to excess, turns into its… — William Matthews Copy Share Image
The power of music that poetry lacks is the ability to persuade without argument. — William Matthews Copy Share Image
