Work and Leisure Quotes
Top 35 Work and Leisure
Quotes
No 1 (Best quote!)
The best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing,
- Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), American
president, pictured right.
Soichiro Honda (1906-91), pictured right,
Honda’s co-founder, agrees:
Real happiness lies in the completion of work, using your own brain and skills.
Albert Camus (1913–60), pictured right, the French writer, also comments:
Without work, all life goes rotten, but when work is soulless, life stifles and dies.
No 2
Before 9/11 my whole world was consumed by Wall Street. I still work hard, but work is no longer my first,
second and third priority.
Ari Schonbrun, 9/11 survivor, pictured right.
Nick Park (1958- ), the English creator
of Wallace and Gromit, pictured right, agrees that work isn’t everything:
I’m married to my work I suppose, although it’s no substitute.
No 3
Good work in pursuit of wrong purposes is more damaging than bad work in pursuit of right purposes,
- Theodore (Ted) Levitt, pictured right, The Marketing Imagination (1983)
No 4
Being busy does not always mean real work.
- Thomas Edison (1847-1931),
pictured right, American inventor
Scott Adams, pictured right, in The Dilbert Principle (1996), agrees:
Real Work + Appearance of Work = Total Work.
No 5
The intellect of man is forced to choose
Perfection of the life, or of the work,
And if it take the second must refuse
A heavenly mansion, raging in the dark.
(from the 1933 poem The Choice)
- W. B. Yeats (1865-1939), pictured right above, Irish poet
No 6
Self-worth is about finding out what you do best and working hard at it.
- J.K. Rowling (1965- ), English
writer, pictured right.
No 7
If all the year were playing holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to work.
(Prince Henry (Hal) in Henry IV
Part 1)
- William
Shakespeare (1564-1616), English playwright, pictured right.
No 8
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.
(from the 1842 poem The Village Blacksmith)
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-82), pictured right above, American poet.
No 9
Diligence is the mother of good luck.
- Benjamin
Franklin (1706-90) American politician, philosopher and inventor, pictured right.
No 10
All that matters is love and work.
- Sigmund Freud (1856–1939),
Austrian psychiatrist, pictured right.
No 11
All intellectual improvement arises from leisure.
- Samuel Johnson (1709–84), English writer, pictured right.
No 12
To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization.
- Bertrand
Russell (1872–1970), English philosopher and mathematician, pictured right.
No 13
Work is the curse of the drinking classes.
- Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), pictured right, Irish writer.
No 14
The only way to do great work is to love what you do.
-Steve Jobs (1955- 2011), co-founder of
Apple, pictured right.
No 15
Anything worth doing is worth 100%.
-Kanosuke
Matsushita (1894-1989), founder of Panasonic, pictured right.
Three other business leaders agree:
I have always done everything with passion.
- Coco Chanel (1883-1971),
the French fashion designer (pictured right)
Passion should be the fire that drives your life’s
work.
- Michael Dell (1965- ), pictured right, founder of Dell
computers
I overcame every single one of my shortcomings by
the sheer passion I brought to my work.
- Sam Walton (1918-1992), pictured right, American
founder Wal-Mart,the world’s biggest retailer
No 16
Lunch is for wimps.
- Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas, pictured right, in the 1987 film Wall Street) .
No 17
How do you make your living? If you call that living...
- Groucho Marx (1890-1977), American comedian and film and TV star, pictured right.
No 18
The three little sentences that will get you through life. Number 1: Cover for me. Number 2: Oh, good idea,
boss! Number 3: It was like that when I got here.
- Homer Simpson, pictured right (in the
American TV series, The Simpsons).
No 19
No race can prosper till it learns there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.
- Booker T.
Washington (1856-1915) African American leader, pictured right.
No 20
Why should the fun, fulfilment, and freedom stop first thing Monday morning and be on hold until Friday
night?
- Ricardo Semler, pictured right, The Seven-Day Weekend
(2003).
No 21
One must work and dare if one really wants to live.
- Vincent van Gogh (1853-90),
pictured right, Dutch impressionist painter
Van Gogh also comments:
What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?
No 22
Immense harm is caused by the belief that work is virtuous.
- Bertrand
Russell (1872–1970), pictured right, English philosopher and mathematician.
Russell also says:
The morality of work is the morality of slaves.
No 23
I've put my genius into my life; I've put only my talent into my works.
- Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), pictured right, Irish writer.
No 24
Anything in life worth having is worth working for.
- Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), pictured
right, American businessman (his motto).
No 25
It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.
- Walt Disney (1901-1966), pictured right
American film maker.
So a song in one of Disney's films, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, pictured right, says:
Whistle while you work.
No 26
To work is to pray.
- St. Benedict (480-547), pictured
right, Italian founder of the Benedictine Order of monks (his motto).
No 27
Leisure is the mother of philosophy.
- Thomas
Hobbes (1588-1679), pictured right, English philosopher.
Frederick Douglass (c1818-95),
the American civil rights leader, pictured right, agrees:
Without money, there’s no leisure, without leisure no thought, without thought no progress.
No 28
Laziness may appear attractive, but work gives satisfaction.
- Anne Frank (1929-1945), pictured right,
Jewish victim of the Holocaust.
No 29
If A is success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth
shut.
- Albert Einstein (1879-1955),
pictured right, German-born American scientist.
No 30
Next to the family, it is work and the relationships established by work that are the true foundations of
society.
-Ernst Friedrich (Fritz) Schumacher, pictured right, in
Small is
Beautiful (1973)
No 31
I don't want to achieve immortality through my work...I want to achieve it by not dying,
- Woody Allen, American film actor and director in the film Annie Hall (1977), pictured
right.
No 32
It is a great mistake to think that the man who
works all the time wins the race.
- Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919),
pictured right, American businessman.
No 33
Work is more fun than fun.
- Noel Coward (1898-1973), English actor, singer and writer, pictured
right
No 34
It's true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure why take the
chance?
- Ronald
Reagan (1911-2004), American president, pictured
right.
No 35
A professional is a man who can do his job when he does not feel like it. An amateur is a man who
can't do his job when he does feel like it .
- James Agate (1877-1947), English writer, pictured
right.
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