The true secret of giving advice is, after you have honestly given it, to be perfectly indifferent whether it is taken or not, and never persist in trying to set people right.
Business men are to be pitied who do not recognize the fact that the largest side of their secular business is benevolence. ... No man ever manages a legitimate business in this life without doing indirectly far more for other men than he is trying to do for himself.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Benevolence is essential in business as it benefits others more than just oneself.
Henry Ward Beecher highlights the importance of benevolence in business, suggesting that true success is not only measured by personal gain but also by the positive impact one has on others. He argues that businesses should be operated with a mindset of benevolence, as the well-being of others plays a crucial role in the legitimacy and success of any enterprise, implying that helping others leads to greater fulfillment in business.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a business conference discussing corporate social responsibility, this quote could inspire leaders to integrate benevolence into their business models.
More from Henry Ward Beecher
All quotes →A man who cannot get angry is like a stream that cannot overflow, that is always turbid. Sometimes indignation is as good as a thunderstorm in summer, clearing and cooling the air.
No one can deal with the hearts of men unless he has the sympathy which is given by love.
We are always on the anvil; by trials God is shaping us for higher things.
No man can tell if he is rich or poor by turning to his ledger. It is the heart that makes a man rich. He is rich according to what he is, not according to what he has.
There are joys which long to be ours. God sends ten thousands truths, which come about us like birds seeking inlet; but we are shut up to them, and so they bring us nothing, but sit and sing awhile upon the roof, and then fly away.
Similar quotes
Entrepreneurs have only the murkiest picture of the future in which they are making their bets, and also there is ambiguity: they don't know when they push this lever or that lever that the outcome is going to be what they think it is going to be - there is the law of unanticipated consequences.
Rules that may be easy for Wall Street are a death sentence for startups. They are easy to break accidentally and the penalty for noncompliance is severe.
Big companies have trouble with innovation. Innovation is about bad ideas, or ideas that look like bad ideas. That's the fundamental thing.
You should not build your customer service system on the premise that your organisation will never question the whims of your clients.
If you aren't committed to diversity of thought, you have no business launching a startup.
Marketing is the way your people answer the phone, the typesetting on your bills and your return policy.