Be true to yourself, help others, make each day your masterpiece, make friendship a fine art, drink deeply from good books - especially the Bible, build a shelter against a rainy day, give thanks for your blessings and pray for guidance every day.

The quote presents a compact ethic for a well-lived life: authenticity, generosity, excellence in ordinary days, and the cultivation of relationships as deliberate craft rather than accident. Wooden links inner formation (“drink deeply from good books”) with outward preparedness (“build a shelter against a rainy day”), suggesting that wisdom and prudence are inseparable. The closing emphasis on gratitude and prayer frames success as morally and spiritually grounded, not merely competitive achievement. Taken together, the list functions like a personal “pyramid” of values—habits that, practiced consistently, shape character and resilience more reliably than talent or circumstance.