Samuel Smiles

1812–1904 · Scottish author, reformer & pioneer of self-improvement writing

Samuel Smiles was a Scottish physician-turned-author whose 1859 book Self-Help became one of the defining works of Victorian self-improvement, selling hundreds of thousands of copies. He championed perseverance, thrift, and character, illustrating his maxims with biographies of inventors, engineers, and self-made men. His later works included Character (1871), Thrift (1875), and Duty (1880).

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“We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success. We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery”

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