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Home |
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. . . see: "CHARACTER" see: "GRIEF" see: "LIFE" see: "PROSPERITY" see: "SICKNESS" see "UNHAPPINESS" for other related links - Mr. Bettenham said that virtuous men were like some herbs and spices, that give not out their sweet smell till they be broken or crushed. --Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher and essayist. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes, and Adversity is not without comforts and hopes. --Francis Bacon (1561-1626) English philosopher and essayist. _Essays_ [1625] "Of Adversity" - Adversity, if for no other reason, is of benefit, since it is sure to bring a season of sober reflection. Men see clearer at such time. Storms purify the atmosphere. --Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) American Congregational minister; [brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe, son of Lyman Beecher]. This is the mark of a really admirable man: stead-fastness in the face of trouble. --Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) German composer. If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome. attributed to both --Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672) The first published American woman writer, and --Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) British author. People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a Light from within. --Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) English poet. In prosperity our friends know us; In adversity we know our friends. --Churton Collins - He that has never known adversity is but half acquainted with others, or with himself. --C.C. Colton (1780-1832) English clergyman and writer. Times of great calamity and confusion have ever been productive of the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace, and the brightest thunderbolt is elicited from the darkest storm. --C.C. Colton (1780-1832) English clergyman and writer. - There is no education like adversity. --Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) British Tory statesman, novelist, and Prime Minister [1868, 1874-1880]. _Endymion_ [1880] - No matter how bad things are, they can always be worse. So what if my stroke left me with a speech impediment? Moses had one, and he did all right. --Kirk Douglas [Issur Danielovitch] (1916- ) American film actor and producer. Before my stroke, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences had voted to award me an Oscar for Lifetime Achievement. I was very pleased and grateful. This particular award is not given often. But would I be ready? I kept working with my speech therapist three times a week. . . . Oscar night was drawing nearer. Every day I did both my oral aerobics and physical exercises religiously. I even tried to read the Torah out loud to my rabbi. I was clutching at straws. Anything to help. Three months passed and I still didn't see any improvement. How can I talk in front of all those people? My speech therapist thought I was making progress, but I didn't believe her. As the night of the Oscars drew near, I became frantic. "Michael, you accept for me." "No way," my son answered emphatically. "You will go up on that stage if you have to crawl." And he walked away. [After being introduced by Steven Spielberg] I stood up, braced my shoulders, took a deep breath, and tried to walk on like Spartacus. I hugged Spielberg and then turned to the audience. I blinked my eyes--two thousand people! On their feet cheering! All this to hear me say "thank you"? Spielberg gave me the Oscar. . . . I thought of the lessons I learned with my speech therapist. Pause . . . breathe . . . swallow . . . articulate. I started slowly: "I see my four sons." I pointed. "They're proud of the old man." The audience responded with a big laugh. They understood me! I spotted my wife covering her face and sobbing--as she later said, ruining a twenty-five-dollar makeup job. I held up the Oscar. "Anne, this belongs to you. I love you." The audience roared their appreciation. . . .They understood me. They really understood me. Confucius said long ago, "A journey of a thousand miles must start with a single step." I accomplished the first important step in my rehabilitation: I spoke before the public, my public. In spite of an impediment, they could make out what I was saying. This fortified another rule for overcoming any disability: Never give up--keep trying! That goes in my "Manual." Letters, faxes, and phone calls came pouring in. one letter startled me. It was from King Hussein, the ruler of Jordan. He was one of the billions watching the Oscar show. He invited me to visit him in Jordan and see the country. Of course, I couldn't make such a long trip, but I thanked him for his kindness. I needed it. His letter encouraged me to work harder with my speech therapist, exercise more, and talk with other people besides my family. When I first heard that King Hussein had died, I felt I had lost a friend. He would never know how much his letter helped me. --Kirk Douglas [Issur Danielovitch] (1916- ) American film actor and producer. _My Stroke of Luck_ [2002], "I Face My Public" - Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss. --Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American philosopher and poet. "Considerations by the Way" [1860] _The Conduct of Life_ [1860] In times of prosperity friends will be plenty, in times of adversity not one in twenty. --English proverb He that can heroically endure adversity will bear prosperity with equal greatness of soul; for the mind that cannot be dejected by the former is not likely to be transported with the latter. --Henry Fielding (1707-1754) English novelist and dramatist. One month in the school of affliction will teach thee more than the great precepts of Aristotle in seven years; for thou canst never judge rightly of human affairs, unless thou hast first felt the blows, and found out the deceits of fortune. --Thomas Fuller (1654-1734) English writer and physician. If the elephants visit your farm you do not worry about the monkeys --Hausa proverb, Nigeria Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents, which in prosperous circumstances would have lain dormant. --Horace [Quintus Horatius Flaccus] (65-8 BC) Roman poet. No man is more unhappy than the one who is never in adversity; the greatest affliction of life is never to be afflicted. Adversity makes men, and prosperity makes monsters. --Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French poet, dramatist, and novelist. Here's to a fellow who smiles, When life runs along like a song, And here's to a lad who can smile, When everything goes dead wrong. --Irish toast But there, everything has its drawbacks, as the man said when his mother-in-law died, and they came down upon him for the funeral expenses. --Jerome K Jerome (1859-1927) English novelist and playwright. _Three Men in a Boat_ [1889] Adversity has ever been considered the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself. --Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. Three hundred years ago a prisoner condemned to the Tower of London carved on the wall of his cell this sentiment to keep up his spirits during his long imprisonment: 'It is not adversity that kills, but the impatience with which we bear adversity.'. --James Keller, _Three Minutes_ [1950] In the adversity of our best friends we often find something which does not displease us. --François de La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680) French classical author. _Maxims_ [1665] #99 Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. --Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American Republican statesman, President [1861-1865]. Adversity reminds men of religion. --Livy [Titus Livius] (59 BC-17 AD) with Sallust and Tacitus, one of the three great Roman historians [EB]. _The History of Rome_ An Eastern proverb says that calamities sent by heaven may be avoided but from those we bring on ourselves there is no escape. --Sir John Lubbock (1834-1913) The First Lord and Baron Avebury who was a British banker, politician, and archaeologist. - Examine the lives of the best and most fruitful men and peoples, and ask yourselves whether a tree, if it is to grow proudly into the sky, can do without bad weather and storms -- whether unkindness and opposition from without; and whether hatred, envy, obstinacy, mistrust, severity, greed, and violence do not belong to the favoring circumstances, without which, a great increase, even in virtue, is hardly possible. Poison destroys the weak nature, but somehow strengthens the strong -- and neither is it called poison. --Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844-1900) German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture. _Frolicking Science_ [1882], ch.19 That which does not kill me makes me stronger. --Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844-1900) German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture. - Prosperity is no just scale; adversity is the only balance to weigh friends. --Plutarch (A.D. 46?-119?) Greek philosopher and biographer. It is a consolation to the wretched to have companions in misery. --Publilius Syrus (85-43 B.C.) Latin writer of mimes who was originally a slave. _Maxims_, #995 The willow which bends to the tempest, often escapes better than the oak which resists it; and so in great calamities, it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner than those of a loftier character. --Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) Scottish novelist and poet. _The Pirate_ [1821], ch. 36 Let us learn to appreciate there will be times when the trees will be bare, and look forward to the time when we may pick the fruit. --Peter Sellers (1925-1980) English comic actor. Fire is the test of gold; adversity, of strong men. --Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C.- 65 A.D.) Roman philosopher and poet. _Moral Essays_, "On Providence" Sweet are the uses of adversity, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. --William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist. _As You Like It_ [1599-1600], Act II, Scene I, Line 12 Remember that in all miseries lamenting becomes fools, and action, wise folk. --Sir Philip Sidney (1554-1586) English soldier, poet, and courtier. When you get into a tight place, and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a moment longer, never give up then -- for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn. --Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) American writer and philanthropist. [Sister of Henry Ward Beecher, daughter of Lyman Beecher]. It is good, too, that we sometimes suffer opposition, and that men think ill of us and misjudge us, even when we do and mean well. Such things are an aid to humility, and preserve us from pride and vainglory. For we more readily turn to God as our inward witness, when men despise us and think no good of us. --Thomas a' Kempis (1380-1471) German ascetical writer. _The Imitation of Christ_ [c. 1420]; Book 1, "On The Uses of Adversity" By trying, we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man's, I mean. --Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835-1910) American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot. _Following the Equator_ [1897] Laugh and the world laughs with you, Weep and you weep alone; For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth, But has trouble enough of its own. --Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet. "Solitiude," published in the _New York Sun_ [25 February 1883]. -- Parable is told of a farmer who owned an old mule. The mule fell into the farmer's well. The farmer heard the mule braying or whatever mules do when they fall into wells. After carefully assessing the situation, the farmer sympathized with the mule, but decided that neither the mule nor the well was worth the trouble of saving. Instead, he called his neighbors together and told them what had happened and enlisted them to help haul dirt to bury the old mule in the well and put him out of his misery. Initially, the old mule was hysterical! But as the farmer and his neighbors continued shoveling and the dirt hit his back, a thought struck him. It suddenly dawned on him that every time a shovel load of dirt landed on his back, he should shake it off and step up! This he did, blow after blow. 'Shake it off and step up --shake it off and step up--shake it off and step up,' he repeated to encourage himself. No matter how painful the blows or distressing the situation seemed, the old mule fought panic and just kept right on shaking it off and stepping up. It wasn't long before the old mule, battered and exhausted, stepped triumphantly over the wall of that well. What seemed like it would bury him actually blessed him--all because of the manner in which he handled his adversity. ----- nadir NAY-dir; nay-DIR, noun: 2. The lowest point; the time of greatest depression or adversity. end page | ABILITY - ABUSE | ACADEMY AWARDS - ACCUSTOMED | ACHIEVEMENT - ACTING | ACTIONS | ACTORS | ACTUARIES - ADVERSARIES | ADVERSITY | ADVERTISING | ADVICE | AFFAIRS - AFGHANISTAN | AGE | AGNOSTICS & AGREEMENT | AIR FORCE - AIRPLANES | ALCOHOL | ALIBI - AMBITION | AMERICA | AMERICANS | AMERICAN INDIANS | AMERICAN REVOLUTION | AMUSEMENT - ANCESTORS | ANGER | ANIMAL RIGHTS & ANIMALS | ANIMOSITIES - APATHY | APOLOGY & APPEARANCE | APPEASEMENT | APPLAUSE - APPRECIATION | APPROPRIATE - APRIL | ARCHAEOLOGISTS - ARCHITECTURE | ARGUMENT | ARISTOCRACY - ARMY | ARROGANCE & ART | ASHAMED - ASTROLOGY | ATHEISM | ATOM BOMB - ATTRACTION | AUSTRALIA | AUTHORITY & AUTOMOBILES | AUTHORS & AUTOBIOGRAPHY | AUTUMN - AVIATION | | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The End | The Reviews | |
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