Ruin and recovering are both from within.

Opportunity beckons more surely when misfortune comes upon a person than it ever does when that person is riding the crest of a wave of success. It sharpens a person's wits, if that person will let it, enabling him or her to see more clearly and evaluate situations with a more knowledgeable judgment.

Remember that you are an actor in a drama of such sort as the Author chooses: if short, then in a short one; if long, then in a long one. If it be His pleasure that you should enact a poor man, or a cripple, or a ruler, or a private citizen, see that you act it well. For this is your business, to act well the given part. But to choose it belongs to Another.

To the rational being only the irrational is unendurable, but the rational is endurable.

Lampis the ship owner, on being asked how he acquired his great wealth, replied, My great wealth was acquired with no difficulty, but my small wealth, my first gains, with much labor.

Seek to be the purple thread in the long white gown.

Neither should a ship rely on one small anchor, nor should life rest on a single hope.