"If in the desert, a lone traveler, in angry protest against the hardships of his journey, were to slash with his knife his goatskin water-bag, letting the hot sand drink up the water that means health, strength, life itself, it would seem—supreme folly. If a shipwrecked sailor were to slip voluntarily from his rude raft …
Tag: William George Jordan
The Hungers of Life III
"There are times in the life of all when, weak and worn with the struggle, the ebb-tide of hope seems to carry out with it all inspiration, all impulse, all incentive. In the darkest night of a great loss, a paralyzing pain, or a voiceless grief we seem to lose our very bearings on life, …
The Hungers of Life II
"Hunger is the voice of a void. It is Nature demanding her rights. It is the restless insistent cry of an instinct, clamouring to be satisfied. There are four great hungers of life,—body-hunger, mind-hunger, heart-hunger and soul-hunger. They are all real; all need recognition; all need feeding. The claim of a hungry body has right …
The Sculpted Figures of Society II
"Real, honest effort, no matter how slight seem results, no matter how weak seem the progress, has no time for mere parade. Their high motives that inspire are: love, honour, truth, justice or those others that lead the ranks of their high purpose. The glowing realization that their work is serious inspires them. Their consecrated …
The Sculpted Figures of Society I
"Over the great doorway of one of New York’s skyscraping office buildings three colossal sculptured figures are posed in crouching attitudes. With their great bowed heads, grimly tense features, and muscles strained like whip- cords they seem to hold on their broad shoulders the terrific weight of twenty or more stories of solid masonry. They …
Facing the Mistakes of Life X
"Failure does not necessarily imply a mistake. If we have held our standard high, bravely fought a good fight for the right, held our part courageously against heavy opposition and have finally seen the citadel of our great hope taken by superior force, by overwhelming conditions, or sapped and undermined by jealousy, envy or treachery …
Facing the Mistakes of Life IX
"Right principles are vital and primary. They bring the maximum of profit from mistakes, reduce the loss to a minimum. False pride perpetuates our mistakes, deters us from confessing them, debars us from repairing them and ceasing them. Man’s attitude towards his mistakes is various and peculiar; some do not see them; some will not …
Facing the Mistakes of Life VIII
"It is a greater mistake to err in purpose, in aim, in principle, than in our method of attaining them. The method may readily be modified; to change the purpose may upset the whole plan of our life. It is easier in mid-ocean to vary the course of the ship than to change the cargo." …
Facing the Mistakes of Life VII
"We cannot relive our old mistakes, but we can make them the means of future immunity from the folly that caused them. If we were impatient yesterday, it should inspire us to be patient today. Yesterday’s anger may be the seed of today’s sweetness. Today’s kindness should be the form assumed by our regret at …
Facing the Mistakes of Life VI
"Musing over the dreams of youth, the golden hopes that have not blossomed into deeds, is a dangerous mental dissipation. In very small doses it may stimulate; in large ones it weakens effort. It over-emphasizes the past at the expense of the present; it adds weights, not wings, to purpose. “It might have been” is …
Gregory Hake 