Self-respect, originating in self-love, instigates the first step of improvement.

It stimulates a man to rise, to look upward, to develop his intelligence, to improve his condition.

Self-respect is the root of most of the virtues--of cleanliness, chastity, reverence, honesty, sobriety.

To think meanly of one's self is to sink; sometimes to descend a precipice at the bottom of which is infamy.
Every man can help himself to some extent.

We are not mere straws thrown upon the current to mark its course; but possessed of freedom of action, endowed with power to stem the waves and rise above them, each marking out a course for himself.