I mean a man whose hopes and aims may sometimes lie (as most men's sometimes do, I dare say) above the ordinary level, but to whom the ordinary level will be high enough after all if it should prove to be a way of usefulness and good service leading to no other. All generous spirits are ambitious, I suppose, but the ambition that calmly trusts itself to such a road, instead of spasmodically trying to fly over it, is of the kind I care for.
Charles DickensDon't be afraid! We won't make an author of you, while there's an honest trade to be learnt, or brick-making to turn to.
Charles DickensMoths, and all sorts of ugly creatures, hover about a lighted candle. Can the candle help it?
Charles DickensI should never have made my success in life if I had not bestowed upon the least thing I have ever undertaken the same attention and care that I have bestowed upon the greatest.
Charles Dickens