Quotes About Discipline and Self-Discipline

A genius?  Perhaps, but before I was a genius, I was a drudge.

— Ignace Jan Paderewski

There is no course of life so weak and sottish as that which is managed by orders, method, and discipline.

— Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

Self-respect is the fruit of discipline; the sense of dignity grows with the ability to say no to oneself.

— Abraham J. Heschel

Discipline is the soul of an army.

— George Washington

If I don’t practice one day, I know it; two days, the critics know it; three days, the public knows it.

— Jascha Heifetz

Theirs not to make reply, theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die.

— Alfred Lord Tennyson

In his later years, Winston Churchill was asked to give the commencement address at Oxford University.  Following his introduction, he rose, went to the podium, and said, “Never, never, never give up.” Then he took his seat.

Order marches with weighty and measured strides; disorder is always in a hurry.

— Napoleon Bonaparte

No man is fit to command another that cannot command himself.

— William Penn

Show me an orchestra that likes its conductor and I’ll show you a lousy conductor.

— Goddard Lieberson

Nothing I do can’t be done by a ten-year-old...with fifteen years of practice.

— Harry Blackstone, Jr., on being a magician

Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

He that leaveth nothing to chance will do few things ill, but he will do very few things.

— George Savile

There is no such thing as a great talent without great willpower.

— Honoré de Balzac

I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.

— Stephen Butler Leacock

It is a very bad thing to become accustomed to good luck.

— Publilius Syrus

Minds, like bodies, will often fall into a pimpled, ill-conditioned state from mere excess of comfort.

— Charles Dickens

The man who does something under orders is not unhappy; he is unhappy when he does something against his will.

— Seneca the Younger

Man’s many desires are like the small metal coins he carries about in his pocket.  The more he has the more they weight him down.

— Satya Sai Baba

I never give them hell.  I just tell the truth and they think it’s hell.

— Harry S. Truman