Some people have greatness thrust upon them. Very few have excellence thrust upon them.

It is not easy to be crafty and winsome at the same time, and few accomplish it after the age of six.

The hallmark of our age is the tension between aspirations and sluggish institutions.

All excellence involves discipline and tenacity of purpose.

Some people seem to believe that for each problem there is a solution readily available - a solution that can be promptly achieved by passing a law and voting some money. I think of this as the vending machine concept of social change. Put a coin in the machine and out comes a piece of candy. If there is a social problem, pass a law and out comes a solution.

America's greatness has been the greatness of a free people who shared certain moral commitments. Freedom without moral commitment is aimless and promptly self-destructive.

Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all.