The success of most things depends upon knowing [well] how much time is needed to succeed.
[Les succès de la plupart des choses dépend de savoir combien il faut de temps pour réussir.]
Charles-Lewis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755) French political philosopher
Pensées Diverses [Assorted Thoughts], # 1007 “General Maxims of Politics,” No. 15 (1720-1755) [tr. Clark (2012)]
(Source)
(Source (French)). Other translations:In most things success depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.
[E.g. (1874)]Success in most things depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.
[E.g. (1883)]The success of most things depends upon knowing how long it will take to succeed.
[E.g. (1915)]Success in the majority of circumstances depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.
[E.g.]Success generally depends upon knowing how long it takes to succeed.
[E.g.]
Quotations about:
duration
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We vaguely know the rules, and the system of scoring, but for God’s sake why don’t they tell us how long the game is?
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
Light burthens, long borne, growe heavie.
George Herbert (1593-1633) Welsh priest, orator, poet.
Jacula Prudentum, or Outlandish Proverbs, Sentences, &c. (compiler), # 15 (1640 ed.)
(Source)
But for my own part, if a book is well written, I always find it too short.
Sleep is perhaps the only among life’s great pleasures which need not be of short duration.
So long as you write what you wish to write, that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say.
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) English modernist writer [b. Adeline Virginia Stephen]
“A Room of One’s Own,” ch. 6 (1929)
(Source)
The joy of love is too short, and the sorrow thereof, and what cometh thereof, dureth over long.
Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.
Earl Nightingale (1921-1989) American motivational speaker, writer, radio personality
(Attributed)
What a day-to-day affair life is.
Jules Laforgue (1860-1887) Franco-Uruguayan Symbolist poet
“Complainte sur certains ennuis,” Les Complaintes (1885)
A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is braver five minutes longer.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
(Spurious)
Frequently ascribed to him, especially in recent decades, but not found in his works.
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