Difficulty, my brethren, is the nurse of greatness a harsh nurse, who roughly rocks her foster children into strength and athletic proportion.
- Bryant, William Cullen

Adversity is the first path to truth.
- Byron, Lord

Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage.
- Channing, William Ellery

A diamond cannot be polished without friction, nor the man perfected without trials.
- Chinese Proverb

Adversity breaks the inferior man's will but only bends the superior man's spirit. Outward influence is denied the great man, who accordingly uses words sparingly but retains his central position.
- Ching, I

The actual tragedies of life bear no relation to one's preconceived ideas. In the event, one is always bewildered by their simplicity, their grandeur of design, and by that element of the bizzare which seems inherent in them.
- Cocteau, Jean

The best way out of a difficulty is through it.
- Anon.

Strong men greet war, tempest, hard times. They wish, as Pindar said, to tread the floors of hell, with necessities as hard as iron.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo

To accuse others for one's own misfortunes is a sign of want of education. To accuse oneself shows that one's education has begun. To accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one's education is complete.
- Epictetus

Common and vulgar people ascribe all ills that they feel to others; people of little wisdom ascribe to themselves; people of much wisdom, to no one.
- Epictetus

The misfortune of the wise is better than the prosperity of the fool.
- Epicurus

In misfortune, what friend remains a friend?
- Euripides

Ignorance of one's misfortunes is clear gain.
- Euripides

Human misery must somewhere have a stop: there is no wind that always blows a storm.
- Euripides

A time of disarray is also a moment of opportunity.
- Ferre, Frederick

Aromatic plants bestow no spicy fragrance while they grow; but crush'd or trodden to the ground, diffuse their balmy sweets around.
- Goldsmith, Oliver

Prosperity is a great teacher; adversity is a greater. Possession pampers the mind; privation trains and strengthens it.
- Hazlitt, William

Greater dooms win greater destinies.
- Heraclitus

When an elephant is in trouble, even a frog will kick h
- Hindu Proverb

Adversity reveals genius, prosperity conceals it.
- Horace

Adversity has the effect of eliciting talents, which in prosperous circumstances would have lain dormant.
- Horace

Adversity borrows its sharpest sting from our impatience.
- Horne, Bishop

Prosperity is not without many fears and distaste; adversity not without many comforts and hopes.
- Bacon, Francis

Prosperity doth best discover vice; but adversity doth best discover virtue.
- Bacon, Francis

No man is more unhappy than the one who is never in adversity; the greatest affliction of life is never to be afflicted.
- Hugo, Victor

Adversity makes men,and prosperity makes monsters.
- Hugo, Victor

As riches and favor forsake a man, we discover him to be a fool, but nobody could find it out in his prosperity.
- La Bruyere, Jean

In great straits and when hope is small, the boldest counsels are the safest.
- Livius, Titus

The nearer the dawn the darker the night.
- Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

Let us be of good cheer, remembering that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never happen.
- Lowell, James Russell

Affliction comes to us, not to make us sad but sober; not to make us sorry but wise.
- Beecher, Harriet Ward

Men often bear little grievances with less courage than they do large misfortun
- Aesop

The drowning man is not troubled by ra
- Persian Proverb

With man, most of his misfortunes are occasioned by man.
- Pliny the Elder

Do you think that you shall enter the Garden of Bliss without such trials as came to those who passed before you?
- Quran

To endure is the first thing that a child ought to learn, and that which he will have the most need to kn
- Rousseau, Jean J.

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.
- Scott, Sir Walter

We become wiser by adversity; prosperity destroys our appreciation of the right.
- Seneca

The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired.
- Seneca

Light troubles speak; the weighty are struck du
- Seneca

Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy.
- Shakespeare, William

Sweet are the uses of adversit
- Shakespeare, William

Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day's own trouble be sufficient for the day. (Matthew 6:34)
- Bible

One's own escape from troubles makes one glad; but bringing friends to trouble is hard grief.
- Sophocles

It is a painful thing to look at your own trouble and know that you yourself and no one else has made
- Sophocles

To be unable to bear an ill is itself a great ill.
- Bion

Learn to see in another's calamity the ills which you should avoid.
- Syrus, Publilius

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
- Truman, Harry

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.
- Unknown

Humanity either makes, or breeds, or tolerates all its afflictions.
- Wells, Herbert George