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I am often
confronted by the necessity of standing by one of my
empirical selves and relinquishing the rest. Not that I
would not. If I could, be... a great athlete and make a
million a year, be a wit, a born -- vivant and a lady
killer, as well as a philosopher, a philanthropist ... and
saint. But the thing is simply impossible. The millionaire's
work would run counter to the saint s; the bon-vivant and
the philanthropist would trip each other up; the philosopher
and the lady killer could not well keep house in the same
tenement of clay. Such different characters may conceivably,
at the outset of life. Be alike possible for a man. But to
make any one of them actual, the rest must more of less be
suppressed. So the seeker of his truest, strongest, deepest
self must review the list carefully and pick out on which to
stake his salvation. All other selves thereupon become
unreal, but the fortunes of this self are real. Its failure
are real failures, its triumphs real triumphs carrying shame
and gladness with them.
-- William James
1842-1910, American
Psychologist, Professor, Author
Failure, then,
failure! so the world stamps us at every turn. We strew it
with our blunders, our misdeeds, our lost opportunities,
with all the memorials of our inadequacy to our vocation.
And with what a damning emphasis does it then blot us out!
No easy fine, no mere apology or formal expiation, will
satisfy the world's demands, but every pound of flesh
exacted is soaked with all its blood. The subtlest forms of
suffering known to man are connected with the poisonous
humiliations incidental to these results.
-- William James
1842-1910, American
Psychologist, Professor, Author
The man who
tries to do something and fails is infinitely better than he
who tries to do nothing and succeeds.
-- Lloyd Jones
Failure is
only postponed success as long as courage ''coaches''
ambition. The habit of persistence is the habit of victory.
-- Herbert Kaufman
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Failure is in
a sense the highway to success, as each discovery of what is
false leads us to seek earnestly after what is true.
-- John Keats
1795-1821, British Poet
I would sooner
fail than not be among the greatest.
-- John Keats
1795-1821, British Poet
There is not a
fiercer hell than the failure in a great object.
-- John Keats
1795-1821, British Poet
Those who dare
to fail miserably can achieve greatly.
-- Robert F. Kennedy
1925-1968, American Attorney
General, Senator
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