Cheerfulness as a Life Power by Orison Swett Marden
page 50 of 77 (64%)
page 50 of 77 (64%)
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performed gives us music at midnight."
Are not buoyant spirits like water sparkling when it runs? "_I have found my greatest happiness in labor_," said Gladstone. "I early formed a habit of industry, and it has been its own reward. The young are apt to think that rest means a cessation from all effort, but I have found the most perfect rest in changing effort. If brain-weary over books and study, go out into the blessed sunlight and the pure air, and give heartfelt exercise to the body. The brain will soon become calm and rested. The efforts of Nature are ceaseless. Even in our sleep the heart throbs on. I try to live close to Nature, and to imitate her in my labors. The compensation is sound sleep, a wholesome digestion, and powers that are kept at their best; and this, I take it, is the chief reward of industry." "Owing to ingrained habits," said Horace Mann, "work has always been to me what water is to a fish. I have wondered a thousand times to hear people say, 'I don't like this business,' or 'I wish I could exchange it for that;' for with me, when I have had anything to do, I do not remember ever to have demurred, but have always set about it like a fatalist, and it was as sure to be done as the sun was to set." "_One's personal enjoyment is a very small thing, but one's personal usefulness is a very important thing." Those only are happy who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness_. "The most delicate, the most sensible of all pleasures," says La Bruyère, "consists in promoting the pleasures of others." And Hawthorne has said that the inward pleasure of imparting pleasure is the choicest of all. "Oh, it is great," said Carlyle, "and there is no other greatness,--to |
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