It is easier to do a job right than to explain why you didn't.
Interpretation
Doing a task correctly is simpler than justifying mistakes.
This quote by Martin Van Buren emphasizes the importance of diligence and competence in any task. It suggests that taking the time to do a job properly will often save one from the complications and difficulties of explaining any failures or shortcomings that arise from negligence or poor execution.
In practice
In a team meeting discussing project deadlines, you might say this quote to encourage thorough work.
To avoid the necessity of a permanent debt and its inevitable consequences, I have advocated and endeavored to carry into effect the policy of confining the appropriations for the public service to such objects only as are clearly with the constitutional authority of the Federal Government.
In time of peace there can, at all events, be no justification for the creation of a permanent debt by the Federal Government. Its limited range of constitutional duties may certainly under such circumstances be performed without such a resort.
The less government interferes with private pursuits, the better for general prosperity.
Those who have wrought great changes in the world never succeeded by gaining over chiefs; but always by exciting the multitude. The first is the resource of intrigue and produces only secondary results, the second is the resort of genius and transforms the universe.
I tread in the footsteps of illustrious men, whose superiors it is our happiness to believe are not found on the executive calendar of any country.
The government should not be guided by Temporary Excitement, but by Sober Second Thought.
For to err in opinion, though it be not the part of wise men, is at least human.
Worry is a down payment on a problem you may never have
The noblest mind the best contentment has
If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prize which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone.
A wound does not destroy us. It activates our self-healing powers. The point is not to "put it behind you" but to keep benefiting from the strength it has awakened.
I don't dare start thinking in the morning. I don't dare start thinking in the morning. If I thought thoughts in bed, Them thoughts would bust my head-- So I don't dare start thinking in the morning.
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