# Diligence

Diligence is steadfast application, assiduousness and industry — the virtue of hard work rather than the sin of careless sloth.

## Quotes

* It is a common proverb, beauteous princess, that diligence is the mother of good fortune.
** Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote de la Mancha (1605-1615), Part I, Book IV, chapter 19.
* Diligence is the mother of good fortune, and idleness — its opposite — never brought a man to the goal of any of his best wishes.
** Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote de la Mancha (1605-1615), Part II, Book IV, chapter 38.
* The more opportunities there are in a Society for some persons to live upon the toil of others, and the less those others may enjoy the fruits of their work themselves, the more is diligence killed, the former become insolent, the latter despairing, and both negligent.
** Anders Chydenius, The National Gain, §20, 1765.
* To rank the effort above the prize may be called love.
** Confucius, Analects, § 6.20.
* I say to you: Make perfect your will. I say: Take no thought of the harvest, But only of proper sowing.
** T. S. Eliot, The Rock (1934).
* The leading rule for the lawyer, as for the man of every other calling, is diligence. Leave nothing for to-morrow which can be done to-day. Never let your correspondence fall behind. Whatever piece of business you have in hand, before stopping, do all the labor pertaining to it which can then be done.
** Abraham Lincoln, Fragment, Notes for a Law Lecture (1 July 1850), cited in Abraham Lincoln: Complete Works, Comprising his Speeches, Letters, State Papers, and Miscellaneous Writings, Vol. 2 (1894)
* You can know how to win through strategy with the long sword, but it cannot be clearly explained in writing. You must practise diligently in order to understand how to win.
** Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings Online : The Water Book (c. 1645).
* The plans of the diligent surely lead to success, but all who are hasty surely head for poverty.
** Solomon, Proverbs 21:5 (NWT)

### Diligence in the law

* It is a reasonable presumption that a man who sleeps upon his rights has not got much right.
** Bowen, L.J., Ex parte Hall; In re Wood (1883), L. R. 23 C. D. 653; reported in James William Norton-Kyshe, Dictionary of Legal Quotations (1904), p. 72.
* The using of legal diligence is always favoured and shall never turn to the disadvantage of the creditor. The maxim Vigilantibus et non dormientibus succurrunt jura is one of those that we learn on our earliest attendance in Westminster Hall.
** Heath, J., Cox v. Morgan (1801), 1 Bos. & Pull. 412; reported in James William Norton-Kyshe, Dictionary of Legal Quotations (1904), p. 72.
* Vigilantibus non dormientibus jura subveniunt: Laws come to the assistance of the vigilant, not of the sleepy.
** Wing, 692; reported in James William Norton-Kyshe, The Dictionary of Legal Quotations (1904), p. 72.

## See also

* Effort
* Laxity
* Perseverance
* Rigor

## External links

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