…a theoretical discovery has but the merit of its existence: it awakens hope, and that is all. But let it be cultivated, let it grow, and you will see what it will become.
Louis Pasteur, The Life of Pasteur
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Uplifting words from sages, poets and naturalists. Every card opens its receipt: the exact source, the locator and how it was verified.
54 quotes · page 1 of 3
…do you love where there is no love, and you shall have love.
John of the Cross, The Complete Works of Saint John of the Cross, Vol. II
If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.
Rabindranath Tagore, Stray Birds
No matter how great is the difficulty, when we finally face it with courage and confidence in ourselves, we seem to pull through somehow, and then we begin to wonder what we were scared about.
William Walker Atkinson, Thought Vibration, or The Law of Attraction in the Thought World
Oh, weep no more! in sorrow's dwelling-place The roses yet shall spring from the bare floor! And heart bowed down beneath a secret pain— Oh stricken heart! joy shall return again, Peace to the love-tossed brain—oh, weep no more!
Hafiz, Poems from the Divan of Hafiz
Secreted and hidden in the heart of the world and in the heart of man is the light which can illumine all life, the future and the past.
Mabel Collins, Through the Gates of Gold
Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement; nothing can be done without hope.
Helen Keller, Optimism: An Essay
…that you may, in your generation, be fit to compare to a candle; that you may, like it, shine as lights to those about you; that, in all your actions, you may justify the beauty of the taper by making your deeds honourable and effectual in the discharge of your duty to your fellow-men.
Michael Faraday, The Chemical History of a Candle
…all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.
Julian of Norwich, Revelations of Divine Love
A sunny disposition is worth more than fortune. Young people should know that it can be cultivated; that the mind like the body can be moved from the shade into sunshine.
Andrew Carnegie, Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie
…scientific work must not be considered from the point of view of the direct usefulness of it. It must be done for itself, for the beauty of science, and then there is always the chance that a scientific discovery may become like the radium a benefit for humanity.
Marie Curie, The Discovery of Radium
Cheerfulness gives elasticity to the spirit. Spectres fly before it; difficulties cause no despair, for they are encountered with hope, and the mind acquires that happy disposition to improve opportunities which rarely fails of success.
Samuel Smiles, Self-Help; with Illustrations of Character and Conduct
Age is not all decay: it is the ripening, the swelling of the fresh life within, that withers and bursts the husk.
George MacDonald, The Marquis of Lossie
The heart flames up with new zeal, new ardour, new love, if the vision is upward.
Emma Curtis Hopkins, Résumé: Practice Book for the Twelve Chapters in High Mysticism
I am astonished at the great things done on this road by encouraging oneself to undertake great things, though we may not have the strength for them at once; the soul takes a flight upwards and ascends high, though, like a little bird whose wings are weak, it grows weary and rests.
Teresa of Ávila, The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus
Though hundreds of thousands had done their very best to disfigure the small piece of land on which they were crowded together, by paving the ground with stones, scraping away every vestige of vegetation, cutting down the trees, turning away birds and beasts, and filling the air with the smoke of naphtha and coal, still spring was spring, even in the town.
Leo Tolstoy, Resurrection
…if you are to reach some further point it can only be by starting from where you are now.
Thomas Troward, The Doré Lectures
Grow as the flower grows, unconsciously, but eagerly anxious to open its soul to the air.
Mabel Collins, Light on the Path
…a man may be haunted with doubts, and only grow thereby in faith. Doubts are the messengers of the Living One to rouse the honest.
George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons, Second Series
Do all you can for yourselves, and then trust to Providence, or luck, or whatever you please to call it, for the rest.
P. T. Barnum, Struggles and Triumphs: or, Forty Years' Recollections of P. T. Barnum
The darkness of centuries is dispersed at once as soon as a light is brought into the room.
Sri Ramakrishna, Ramakrishna: His Life and Sayings
Enter upon to-morrow with a clean slate and a free mind. Don't be mortgaged to the past, and never look back.
Orison Swett Marden, Pushing to the Front
The breeze of His grace is blowing night and day over thy head. Unfurl the sails of thy boat (mind) if thou wantest to make rapid progress through the ocean of life.
Sri Ramakrishna, Ramakrishna: His Life and Sayings
Below there may be storm, but above there is calm, and there is the Place of Peace.
Annie Besant, The Spiritual Life