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Work

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“Freedom without organization of work would be useless. The child left free without means of work would go to waste, just as a new-born baby, if left free without nourishment, would die of starvation.The organization of the work, therefore, is the cornerstone of this new structure of goodness [in education], but even that organization would be in vain without the liberty to make use of it.”
Maria Montessori (1870–1952) first seen 1914 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Dr. Montessori's Own Handbook: A short guide to her ideas and materials (1914), Schocken Books, Inc." New York, p. 94
“Work democracy is the natural process of love, work and knowledge which has always governed economy and the social and cultural life of man and always will, as long as there is a human society. Work democracy is the sum total of all naturally developed and developing life functions which organically govern rational human relationships.”
Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957) said by 1957 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whether some people like it or not, Fiji is already a multiracial society. We have different races, but that does not mean we should only work for the good of our own race. We have to truly understand one another, learn each other’s languages, and truly work together. There is huge potential in Fiji, and we would be amazed to see what we will achieve, if we work together.”
Epeli Ganilau (1951–2023) said by 2023 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Order gives due measure to the members of a work considered separately, and symmetrical agreement to the proportions of the whole. It is an adjustment according to quantity. By this I mean the selection of modules from the members of the work itself and, starting from these individual parts of members, constructing the whole work to correspond.”
Vitruvius (80–15 BC) said by 15 BC at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I could not think that GOD was poor, that He was short of resources, or unwilling to supply any want of whatever work was really His. It seemed to me that if there were lack of funds to carry on work, then to that degree, in that special development, or at that time, it could not be the work of GOD.”
James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) said by 1905 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Worthy work carries with it the hope of pleasure in rest, the hope of the pleasure in our using what it makes, and the hope of pleasure in our daily creative skill. All other work but this is worthless; it is slaves' work — mere toiling to live, that we may live to toil.”
William Morris (1834–1896) said by 1896 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Work, work and work and we are bound to success.”
Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) first seen 1947 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech from Radio Pakistan at Lahore, 30 October 1947
“Industry in art is a necessity - not a virtue - and any evidence of the same, in the production, is a blemish, not a quality; a proof, not of achievement, but of absolutely insufficient work, for work alone will efface the footsteps of work.”
James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) said by 1903 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No man is born into the world whose work Is not born with him. There is always work, And tools to work withal, for those who will; And blessed are the horny hands of toil.”
James Russell Lowell (1819–1891) first seen 1843 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A Glance Behind the Curtain" (1843), p. 176
“It always does seem to me that I am doing more work than I should do. It is not that I object to the work, mind you; I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours. I love to keep it by me: the idea of getting rid of it nearly breaks my heart.”
Jerome K. Jerome (1859–1927) said by 1927 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Our work is the embodiment of our will. The spiritual manifestation of this work is its effect. When such work is properly done it brings happiness, and when carried out incorrectly it assuredly brings misery. Humanity! Your will is paramount! You can command Nature if you but obey her!”
Viktor Schauberger (1885–1958) said by 1958 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Work is my joy.. .Work is my therapy, I don't know anybody who loves work as much as I do.”
Robert Rauschenberg (1925–2008) said by 2008 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The great genius of this church is work. Everybody works. You do not grow unless you work. Faith, testimony of the truth is just like the muscle of my arm. If you use it, it grows strong. If you put it in a sling, it grows weak and flabby. We put people to work. We expect great things of them, and the marvelous and wonderful thing is they come through.”
Gordon B. Hinckley (1910–2008) first seen 2002 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speaking to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council, June 12, 2002.
“I am like a poet on the threshold of a work, an accursed, sterile poet who will leave no glory behind, to whom chance lent the truth that genius would have given him, a frail work which will pass away with me, mortal and sealed to others like myself, but a sublime work nevertheless, which will show the essential outlines of life and relate the drama of dramas.”
Henri Barbusse (1873–1935) said by 1935 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Eating, bathing, going to the toilet, talking, thinking, and many other activities related to the body are all work. How is it that the performance of one particular act is alone (considered) work? To be still is to be always engaged in work. To be silent is to be always talking.”
Ramana Maharshi (1879–1950) said by 1950 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Five coordinating mechanisms seem to explain the fundamental ways in which organizations coordinate their work: mutual adjustment, direct supervision, standardization of work processes, standardization of work outputs, and standardization of worker skills.”
Henry Mintzberg (born 1939) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Work and play are an artificial pair of opposites, because the best kind of play contains an element of work, and the most productive kind of work must include something of the spirit of play.”
Sydney J. Harris (1917–1986) said by 1986 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Labels are very important to me. They’re a way of finding community and a way of community finding you. If people are looking for my work because they’re looking for the work of another woman or the work of a science fiction writer or a black writer, it helps if they know that I am that. For me, identity is kind of a mailbox.”
Nalo Hopkinson (born 1960) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To work for peace and reconciliation is central to the mission of the Church. For the Church exists in order to carry on the saving work of Jesus under the guidance of the Spirit. And his saving work is interpreted in the New Testament as reconciliation and peace-making. According to Paul, God was in Christ Jesus reconciling the world to himself.”
Kurien Kunnumpuram (1931–2018) first seen 2007 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kunnumpuram, K. (ed) (2007) World Peace: An Impossible Dream?, Mumbai: St Pauls
“I object to several popular ideas. I don't think anyone's work is reductive. The most the term can mean is that new work doesn't have what the old work had. Its not so definitive that a certain kind of form is missing; a description and discussion of the kind present is pretty definitive.”
Donald Judd (1928–1994) first seen 1968 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Donald Judd, ‎William C. Agee (1968) Don Judd, p. 15
“I would love to work with Salman. We have a great tuning so if we work together, it will be great fun. But till the time we don't get a good script, a script that excites both of us, we can't work together.”
Aamir Khan (born 1965) first seen 2011 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On Salman Khan, 10 September 2011. .
“All artistic work, like all human activity, involves the joint activity of a number, often a large number of people. Through their cooperation, the art work we eventually see or hear comes to be and continues to be. The work always shows signs of that cooperation.”
Howard S. Becker (1928–2023) said by 2023 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Brothers! We want from you more work. We want from you work and perfection. We want from you continuous work. Every day must be utilized to accumulate benefits for this homeland and this people.”
Abd al-Karim Qasim (1914–1963) first seen 1959 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech delivered in the gardens of the Shaab Hall (May 1, 1959).
“…Justice is educative, justice is apolitical, justice resists nothing, for it is the normative state, may even go as far as saying that justice is, in the Aristotelian sense, aesthetic. Therefore what preoccupies me in my work is the art itself. It is a question of fidelity: I refuse for my work to serve anything or anyone but itself; more precisely, the work refuses, and I obey.”
Hisham Matar (born 1970) first seen 2007 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On being more inclined towards justice than politics in “An Interview with Hisham Matar” in Words Without Borders (August 2007)
“I envy men whose yards are gay, But never work as hard as they; I also envy men who own More wealth than I have ever known. I'm like a lot of men who yearn For joys that they refuse to earn.You cannot have the joys of work And take the comfort of a shirk. I find the man I envy most Is he who's longest at his post. I could have gold and roses, too, If I would work like those who do.”
Edgar Guest (1881–1959) said by 1959 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Now many excellent scientists in India are doing really first rate work and it should not matter when the next Indian Nobel Prize is because they are doing very good work — that is what matters and the more you have this infrastructure, with good scientists within India, eventually someone will get a Nobel Prize for work done within India.”
Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (born 1952) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In this Age, work purifies and is the best spiritual practice (…) Work is so good that it prevents disease and gives you mental ease. Work is such a good thing that it relieves man of all ailments.”
Haidakhan Babaji (2000–1984) said by 1984 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I didn’t know what we were building was a monster. The pressure was coming from different directions... stories that it will never work, it will never work, it will never work.”
Aliko Dangote (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have after years of thinking on the subject come to the conviction that work is the only instrument of effective education. It may sometimes be manual work, at others, non-manual work.”
Zakir Hussain (politician) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We work with broken families and broken people who've lost hope and are helpless. If people oppose my work, launch personal attacks, we know that we are on the right path. One colleague was shot, another was beaten to death. I've injuries all over my body. We work against a social evil. If this evil isn't reacting it means we aren't a threat.”
Kailash Satyarthi (born 1954) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If one wanted to make a work of art devoid of meaning, it would be impossible because we’ve already given meaning to the work by indicating that it’s a work of art.”
Joseph Kosuth (born 1945) first seen 1960 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Joseph Kosuth, “Introduction” in Art After Philosophy and After: Collected Writings, 1960–1990 (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991); cited in: Thierry Mortier. "Semiotics as Art: Kosuth," Sunday, 1 July 2012.
“We do not work for men. We work for the land and the people. We do not even work for money.”
Alan Paton (1903–1988) said by 1988 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Nothing can be learned without mental exertion. If you are concerned in your further development, you will recognize the Christian word as to the curse of work as untrue. Work cannot be descended from sin, for it is a blessing. You will have experienced in yourself how elated one feels after successful physical or mental work.”
Joseph Dietzgen (1828–1888) said by 1888 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Now my work is my drug of choice…I like to take whatever work opportunities I can. I like to work with as many people as I can. I like to show up on time, and I like to have a good time.”
Alaska Thunderfuck 5000 (born 1985) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When I work I work very fast, but preparing the work can take any length.”
Cy Twombly (1928–2011) first seen 2008 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Remark at the 'photo-exhibition Cy Twombly', museum Marseille, Amsterdam, Autumn 2008
“Theorem of the equivalence of Heat and Work. ...Mechanical work may be transformed into heat, and conversely heat into work, the magnitude of the of the one being always proportional to that of the other.”
Rudolf Clausius (1822–1888) said by 1888 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A work on tidal theory... led me to Lagrange's Mécanique analytique and thereby I returned to those ideas of analysis. All the developments in that work were transformed through the principles of the new analysis in such a simple way that the calculations often came out more than ten times shorter than in Lagrange's work.”
Hermann Grassmann (1809–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A conservative is someone who helps disguise the true nature of a democratic state. The conservative is ineffective by definition, because his goal is to make democracy work properly. The fact that it does not work properly, has never worked properly, and will never work properly, sails straight over his head. He therefore labors cheerfully as a tool for his enemies.”
Curtis Yarvin (born 1973) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If you are unable to change many aspects of your work, you must alter your mindset – learning to stop thinking about your work as boring or dull; viewing the glass as half full rather than half empty; finding the positives in your daily work and career.”
Nigel Cumberland (born 1967) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Psychology of Management, as here used, means, the effect of the mind that is directing work upon that work which is directed, and the effect of this undirected and directed work upon the mind of the worker.”
Lillian Gilbreth (1878–1972) said by 1972 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In order to do a good job a person must like what he or she is doing... If you do things just because you have to, then you will never enjoy work. Nor will you do a good job if you do it simply out of a sense of duty. Stress is often a by-product of such passive or negative attitudes toward work. Paradoxically as it may sound, love of work can be the best medicine for workaholism.”
Matsushita Konosuke (1894–1989) first seen 1989 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kōnosuke Matsushita in: The Mirror, (1989), Vol. 25, p. 18
“Marc Bloch has been a source of inspiration...one way to give some indicaion of my reaction to his work is to provide my thoughts in different decades to his work for...he meant something different to me in different phases of my work and my understanding of what he was saying has shifted considerably.”
Marc Bloch (1886–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“By definition, (I begin), alternative medicine (I continue) has either not been proved to work, or has been proved not to work. You know what they call alternative medicine that has been proved to work? Medicine.”
Tim Minchin (born 1975) first seen 2013 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Storm", 2013
“My bill would allow people to become an apprentice as a painter, as a glazier, as an electrician, to work for a small business, for a union doing private work, and really develop the skills to have meaningful work in either the public sector or the private sector.”
Ro Khanna (born 1976) first seen 2018 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted in California congressman has a “jobs for all” plan to unite both wings of the Democratic Party, By A.P. Joyce, Mic (May 28, 2018)
“It doesn't work, when you're thinking. It doesn't work… It doesn't work, do you understand that? Because we see, the viewer sees: you're thinking. And so we're worried, we're preoccupied, right. Is she OK?”
Alonzo King (born 1952) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Just work, work, work, even at the risk of making mistakes. And if and when you do make mistakes, and you do hurt someone, ask for forgiveness. Asking forgiveness and admitting you've made a mistake is the hardest thing of all. But if someone else does you good, remember it always. Showing gratitude is every bit as complicated.”
Fausto Brizzi (born 1968) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I always believed that if I was willing to defend the veracity of my work and if I was willing to hold that work up for evaluation — for critique and judgment — then who I was when I was doing the work would eventually matter less. And that took time. And I took hits. But I do think that that is ultimately what happened.”
Tressie McMillan Cottom (born 1976) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My contemplation led to what might be one of the most radical and yet believable (to me) conspiracy theories of all: if we do our healing work well, someone will either point a gun to our heads (and maybe shoot it) or give us a bribe to keep quiet, to cease doing our work if we want to stay alive. Sometimes they can even order us to help them do their dirty work.”
Brian O'Leary (1940–2011) said by 2011 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Apply yourself fully to the introspection offered here. It is good for all seekers... This self-inquiry is your internal work. Internal work – eternal satisfaction. Internal work revealing timeless Self.”
Mooji (born 1954) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As we all adapt and respond to these unprecedented times, we need to make sure these dollars are put to work and put to work in the best way for Missouri to get back on its feet, put the economy back to work, and get Missouri families moving forward again.”
Scott Fitzpatrick (born 1987) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Fitzpatrick leading working group analyzing federal coronavirus relief money (April 10, 2020)