Quote#Wisdom
We neglect the opportunities which are always present, and imagine…
Quote byJohn Lancaster Spalding · 1840–1916
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 75.
English (original)
We neglect the opportunities which are always present, and imagine that if those that are rare were offered, we should put them to good use. Thus we waste life waiting for what if it came we should be unprepared for.
— John Lancaster Spalding
More from John Lancaster Spalding
The world is chiefly a mental fact. From mind it receives the forms of time and space, the principle of casuality[sic], color, warmth, and beauty. Were there no mind, there would be no world.
True readers … are ready to go through a whole volume, if there be but hope of finding in it a single genuine thought or the mere suggestion even of a truth which has some fresh application to life.
The strong man is he who knows how and is able to become and be himself; the magnanimous man is he who, being strong, knows how and is able to issue forth from himself, as from a fortress, to guide, protect, encourage, and save others.
However firmly thou holdest to thy opinions, if truth appears on the opposite side, throw down thy arms at once.
Each one fashions and bears his world with him, and that unless he himself become wise, strong and loving, no change in his circumstances can make him rich or free or happy.
To ask them to read books whose life-breath is pure thought and beauty is as though one asked them to read things written in a language they do not understand and have no desire to learn.