Opportunity

“ Do not wait for an opportunity to be all that you want to be; when an opportunity to be more than you are now is presented and you feel impelled toward it, take it. It will be the first step toward a greater opportunity. ”

“ Experience taught us that when we embraced one opportunity, one responsibility, the acceptance of it invariably led to another, and so the servant who had five talents, five opportunities, gained ten. ”

“ If, in this position, there be much to excite wonder, [Pg 1111] there is still more for gratitude in the unparalleled opportunity which it affords. What we all ask is opportunity. Here is opportunity on a surpassing scale—to be employed, I am sure, so as to advance the best interests of the Human Family; and, if these are advanced, no nation can suffer. Each is contained in all. ”

“ Remember you make the world noble; and, if you have an absorbing desire to work in some other way, watch every little loop-hole of opportunity, and see if you cannot make it large enough to jump through to a wider field. ”

“ Is this not, indeed, a most beautiful world, and ours the land of opportunity, progress, education? Let our faces, then, be ever glad and shining. Let us tune ourselves with the Infinite; let a golden thread run through all our days ”

“ There is in the mind of God a plan which embraces every creature of all his vast domains, and this plan is an eternal purpose of boundless opportunity, unlimited progress, and endless life. And the infinite treasures of such a matchless career are yours for the striving! ”

“ That may be true, but by sheer force of will, we can find a way to bring us another opportunity. There is no truth in the saying that opportunity knocks at our door but once in a lifetime. The fact is, opportunity never seeks us ”

“ Variety and novelty of experience, further quickened by a consciousness trained to an equally nimble power of movement, individualism, the capacities, the claim, of the individual, forced into their utmost play by a ready sense and dexterous appliance of opportunity,—herein, certainly, lay at least one half of their vocation in history. ”

“ To keep in the rear of opportunity in matters of indulgence is as valuable a habit as to keep abreast of opportunity in matters of enterprise. ”

“ He who improves an opportunity sows a seed which will yield fruit in opportunity for himself and others. ”

“ Knowledge brings responsibility, along with opportunity. To yield to what you know to be wrong, or to go back a step in order to gain force for a greater spring forward, is to miss your opportunity. Lives may pass before you gain the same opportunity again. ”

“ The opportunity is tempting, but not easily manageable, and far too perilous, both in respect to those individuals whom we might bring forward, and the far greater number that must needs be left in the shade. ”

“ We must have system, constructive method, springing from a widely inventive imagination, a method checked up at each turn by results achieved. We have said long enough that America means opportunity; we must now begin to ask: Opportunity for what, and how shall the opportunity be achieved? ”

“ To most other acts of virtue or exertions of wisdom, a concurrence of many circumstances is necessary, some previous knowledge must be attained, some uncommon gifts of nature possessed, or some opportunity produced by an extraordinary combination of things; but the mere power of saving what is already in our hands, must be easy of acquisition to every mind ”

“ Seize the opportunity: tell the truth, as simply and briefly as possible, and the beginning is made; watch for and utilize all such opportunities, as they come, and the main road of the task is marked out; shock is minimized, if not eliminated, mutual confidence is engendered, and a priceless reward may be won. ”

“ You must be not only present in the body, but watchful in mind, if you would avail yourself of the fleeting opportunity. Accordingly, look about you for the opportunity; if you see it, grasp it, and with all your energy and with all your strength devote yourself to this task, – to rid yourself of those business duties. ”

“ The lack of opportunity is ever the excuse of a weak, vacillating mind. Opportunities! Every life is full of them. Every lesson in school or college is an opportunity. Every examination is a chance in life. Every patient is an opportunity. Every newspaper article is an opportunity. Every client is an opportunity. Every sermon is an opportunity. Every business transaction is an opportunity,—an opportunity to be polite,—an opportunity to be manly,—an opportunity to be honest,—an opportunity to make friends. ”

“ They call forth the energies of the entire being. Foresight, calculation, enterprise, courage, self-control; fertility in resources; the ability to recognize and embrace an opportunity, are all required. ”

“ Seize the Very first possible opportunity to act on every resolution you make, and on every emotional prompting you may experience in the direction of the habits you aspire to gain. ”

“ Unless you have prepared yourself to profit by your chance, the opportunity will only make you ridiculous. A great occasion is valuable to you just in proportion as you have educated yourself to make use of it. ”

“ To find out what one is fitted to do and to secure an opportunity to do it is the key to happiness. ”

“ The nature that works, proceeds from the necessary laws and forces of its being, and is as simple and unconscious as any other natural law or force. Hence there are no startling epochs to record in my father's history, no supreme efforts; in filling the measure of daily opportunity lay his chief work. ”

“ Opportunity knocks at some people's doors nearly every day of their lives and is given a royal welcome. That's what Opportunity likes—appreciation. It goes often to the home where the latchstring hangs on the outside. ”

“ But success and failure are matters of opportunity; the worthy and the worthless are distinguished by their talents. Superior men of wide learning and wise schemes, who have failed from want of opportunity, are many indeed ”

“ The possession of this power involves new possibilities, for opportunity is offered for the special pursuits of knowledge and the assistance of the weak or undeveloped part of mankind in its struggles. ”

“ The facility with which men and women of humble antecedents reach high position here is easily explained. Their early disadvantages have taught them enterprise, to look out for their own advantage and seize every opportunity. They have ambition. ”

“ And in the same manner, the growth and strivings of his fellows call forth his unselfish aid. Having infinite treasures of mental equipment, gained by superior opportunity and wider experience, [Pg 171] he will generously share his noble possessions. ”

“ I believe many people have experienced a semi-consciousness of the presence of opportunity and allowed it to pass unheeded by, that had they taken it up intelligently and properly studied and developed it they would have become famous. ”

“ Kind words and loving deeds are as pebbles cast upon the great sea of humanity, the ever-widening circle of whose influence extends beyond the limited vision of him who projects them; and the eternal ages alone will reveal how many souls have been saved, and saved forever, as the grand result. How many girls and boys are watching every opportunity to share in this blessed work? ”

“ The really essential factors of success in any undertaking are money and opportunity, and as a rule, the man who can make the first can make the second. ”

“ Could I work for outward success only, or chiefly, subordinating aspiration to what stifles aspiration? Would riches satisfy me? Would actual power over men, ecclesiastical, civil, or social? Could I live for ambition, and sit down unapproved of my better life to enjoy its achievements? Would the acquisition of knowledge and its employment as a means of worldly power, distinction, and advantage satisfy the inner hunger which longs for the truth, the light, the harmony of highest heavens? ”

“ I know that my future is uncertain, that it may be thorny, that I shall need all the energy and strength of will I possess, in order to succeed; but it will be my future, my own life, which I may shape and order as I please, unfettered by the galling chain of benefits conferred. ”

“ I believe that opportunities come to all,—not the same opportunities, nor the same kind of opportunities, nor opportunities half so valuable in some cases as in others, but they do come, and if seen and grasped will work a vast improvement in the life and character of an individual. ”

“ But surely it is better to pass into the next region of life having reaped some assurance, some firmness of character, determination of effort, and consciousness of the worth of life, in the present world ”

“ The accomplishment of your purpose now means that your experience is viewed by you as the present and conscious expression of a plan. Well, what is, precisely in so far as it is, is in the same way a whole experience finally expressing and consciously fulfilling a plan. And the Being of the real object of which you now think means a life that expresses the fulfilment of just your present plan, in the greatest measure in which your plan itself is logically capable of fulfilment. ”

“ Why need you choose so painfully your place, and occupation, and associates, and modes of action, and of entertainment? Certainly there is a possible right for you that precludes the need of balance and wilful election. For you there is a reality, a fit place and congenial duties. Place yourself in the middle of the stream of power and wisdom which animates all whom it floats, and you are without effort impelled to truth, to right, and a perfect contentment. ”

“ We emerged into a brief independence of will, made our personal innovation, became, as it were, new thoughts in that great intelligence, new elements of effort and purpose, and were presently incorporated or forgotten or both in its immortal growth. ”

“ What should be the plan of my life? Should I go into business, and make a great fortune? Should I go into literature, and make myself an imperishable name? Should I go into politics, and control the destinies of nations? ”

“ In any work there is possible, first, more or less of the workman's interest—an interest not merely in a conventional standard of excellence in the finished result but also in betterment of the standard and in a corresponding heightened excellence of technique and spirit in the execution.49 These interests, without reference to the useful result and "for their own sake" (i.e., for the workman's sake, in ways not specifiable in advance) , may command a share of one's available time, strength, and resources. ”

“ Personal distinction, success, depend, not on the average bulk of knowledge, power, and skill, but on that margin that extends a little beyond the reach of one’s fellows, a margin gained by some extra devotion, by sacrifice and work, by ideals a little more advanced or more clearly seen. ”

“ That ambition, which, conceived in early youth, had decided my career and sweetened all its labours,—the ambition to take a rank and leave a name as one of the great pathologists to whom humanity accords a grateful, if calm, renown,—saw before it a level field and a certain goal. ”

“ If time permitted I could take up every occupation, every avocation, every profession and every calling, and show you that no matter which way we turn—no matter what we do—we are always and everywhere weighing the Soul. ”

“ There is the most perfect harmony; there is relatively easy settlement of problems and difficulties if but this principle be adopted; that you have taken as your chief business in life the ends of true religion, the development of character and the service of humanity, and, with this purpose, the daily toil, the opportunities and enginery of your trade or profession shall be made to serve these higher ends. ”

“ A career well begun—a life commenced properly, with wise forecast, with prudent rules of action, and under the influence of sound and pure, moral and religious principles—is an advance, half-way at least, to ultimate success and prosperity. ”

“ To see in these grand surroundings the development of good principle and the struggle toward a more perfect life; to admire the spirit of enterprise as it works toward a great plan, which seems to be in relation to the great plan which nature itself has followed, and at last to anticipate by a secret feeling, the future greatness and prosperity which lies before this growing country. ”

“ I have observed in considering the nature of ambition, that the great feel a double pleasure in authority from the comparison of their own condition with that of their slaves; and that this comparison has a double influence, because it is natural, and presented by the subject. ”

“ Thus, whether we look at the dignity of the subject matter, or at the nature of the mental exercise which it requires, or at the nature of the field over which the pursuit ranges, History, the knowledge of the adventures, the development, the changeful career, the varied growths, the ambitions, aspirations, and, if you like, the approximating destinies of mankind, claims a place second to none in the roll of Sciences. ”