“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.”
Attributed to Tony Robbins (in this exact formulation) and many others in similar words on the Internet (for instance “Do what you have always done and you’ll get what you have always got” sourced to Sue Knight) - I have no idea who first said it or in what words. But a very large number of people have demonstrated its truth in practice... including me. Dang.
“First catch your hare, said Mrs Beeton’s famous cooking instructions for the jugged variety.”
The Economist February 23, 1991
“Indeed, it would be paradoxical if the end were amusement; if we toiled and suffered all our lives long to amuse ourselves. For we choose practically everything for the sake of something else, except happiness, because it is the end. To spend effort and toil for the sake of amusement seems silly and unduly childish; but, on the other hand the maxim of Anacharsis, ‘Play to work harder,’ seems to be on the right lines, because amusement is a form of relaxation, and people need relaxation because they cannot exert themselves continuously.”
Aristotle Ethics
“He could not care less about the number of hours he had to put in.”
Another of the "He's an extraordinary man" style phrases to use in a two-edged letter of recommendation, this one for a lazy or unambitious person; it is on various websites but I do not know where it originated.
“Who am I that the children of men should have shaped and carved for me four extra wooden legs besides the two that were given me by the gods?”
G.K. Chesterton, “On Being Moved,” in Alberto Manguel, ed., On Lying in Bed and Other Essays by G.K. Chesterton
“All plans of government, which suppose great reformation in the manners of mankind, are plainly imaginary.”
David Hume, Idea of a Perfect Commonwealth quoted in Samuel Brittan Against the Flow
“It’s budget season in Canada — the time of year when economists emerge from their dens, shake the moss out of their hair, scratch a tree, note the length of their shadow and use it to predict that the economy will definitely grow this year unless conditions cause it to stall.”
Monte Solbert in Ottawa Sun February 24, 2014
“There is no trap so deadly as the trap you set for yourself.”
Philip Marlowe’s internal monologue in Raymond Chandler The Long Goodbye