From the very beginning, the contributions of Samuel Smiles were concerned with the welfare of his fellow humans. Born at the end of 1812, Smiles was the eldest of eleven children, and therefore was often responsible for looking after his siblings in Haddington, Scotland. He attended school until the age of fourteen when he took up a medical apprenticeship with Dr. Robert Lewins. After gaining some experience and knowledge as an apprentice, Smiles began at Edinburgh University in 1829 to further his medical studies. While pursuing his degree, his interest was taken by the campaign for parliamentary reform. His articles on the topic were frequently published in the Edinburgh Weekly Chronicle.

Graduating in 1832, Smiles worked as a doctor in Haddington but continued his involvement in political interests. In 1837, Smiles became a regular contributor to the Leeds Times. A year later, the paper recruited him as its editor. Leaving his medical career, Smiles dedicated his life to the cause of political reform, social improvement, and unification of the working and middle classes. His was a philosophy grounded in utilitarianism and the staunch morality of his Victorian era.

As time passed, Smiles became disillusioned by political reform and the political systems in which reform was given lip-service but no real substance. It was in this disillusionment that Smiles came to the realization that the key to a society's improvement was within the responsibility of each individual. He became convinced that if each individual would concern himself with his own improvement, the whole of society would be better for it. Each member doing his part rather than the institutions and systems reaching down to enforce improvement on the individual citizens. To this point, he begins the first chapter of his best-know work "Self-Help" with a quote from John Stuart Mill: "The worth of a state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it."

In 1845 Smiles left the Leeds Times to become the secretary to the Leeds and Thirsk Railway. Nine years later he moved on to take a similar position with the South-Eastern Railway. Smiles had completely abandoned his interest in political reform by the 1850s, making a new dedication to the advocacy of personal development and reform. To that end, he created and delivered a series of lectures to workmen and businessmen. He began with a course of self-help classes in Leeds. The popularity of these classes created a strong following for Smiles who continued with lectures and later turned them into his published works of self-improvement. "Self-Help," "Character," "Thrift," and "Duty" are the resulting collections.

Into his eighties, Smiles continued to share his messages of self-improvement and development. He lived well and died peacefully in 1904. The life stories that he captured in stand-alone biographies and as illustrations and examples within his self-improvement works still stand as models for a successful life.