Quotes About Excellence

The desire of excellence is the necessary attribute of those who excel. We work little for a thing unless we wish for it. But we cannot of ourselves estimate the degree of our success in what we strive for; that task is left to others. With the desire for excellence comes, therefore, the desire for approbation. And this distinguishes intellectual excellence from moral excellence; for the latter has no necessity of human tribunal; it is more inclined to shrink from the public than to invite the public to be its judge.

I have always looked at it this way: If you strive like crazy for perfection - an all-out assault on total perfection - at the very least you will hit a high level of excellence, and then you might be able to sleep at night. To accomplish something truly significant, excellence has to become a life plan.

When the original is well chosen and judiciously copied, the imitator often arrives at excellence which he could never have attained without direction; for few are formed with abilities to discover new possibilities of excellence, and to distinguish themselves by means never tried before.

I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for; perfection is God's business.

Excellence is the eternal quest. We achieve it by living up to our highest intellectual standards and our finest moral intuitions. In seeking excellence, take life seriously-but never yourself!

In the end, excellence in education means excellence in teaching, and if this country would give the status to first grade teachers that we give to full professors, this one act alone would revitalize the nation's schools.

When you have a spirit of excellence, you do the right thing not because somebody is watching or making you do it; you do it because it's the right thing to do.

We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence. But they hesitate, waiting for the other fellow to make the first move-and he, in turn, waits for you.

In peace-armies discipline meant the hunt, not of an average but of an absolute; the hundred per cent standard in which the ninety-nine were played down to the level of the weakest man on parade.... The deeper the discipline, the lower was the individual excellence; also the more sure the performance.

It is called the real presence, not in an exclusive sense, as though other forms of presence were not real, but by reason of its excellence. It is the substantial presence by which Christ is made present without doubt, whole and entire, God and man.

Making a judgment, taking a stand and then acting against an injustice or acting to support excellence is the stuff of the everyman hero. If you are an aspiring artist and you wish to avoid “judgments,” you'll find that you have nothing to say.

Christians should ultimately do everything that we do with excellence. There's a story about repairs in the Sistine Chapel ... when some repair work was being done the craftsmen saw that the work on the other side of the plaster, the part not visible to the human eye was done with the same kind of craftsmanship that was done on what was visible and observable. And the explanation for that is that the work that Christians do is not just for human consumption, but it is also for the eyes of God.

I personally, only work with people in my business who show excellence. I have a business, the business of enlightenment.

I think that more diversity is a good thing, and fresh points of view articulated by people who are committed to excellence in journalism is a beneficial change in the American media landscape.

Vision is dandy, but sustainable company excellence comes from a huge stable of able managers.

Trying to do well and trying to beat others are two different things. Excellence and victory are conceptually distinct . . . and are experienced differently.

The Grammys are supposed to be awards for artistic excellence… Iggy Azalea’s not excellent.

Excellence is the best deterrent to racism or sexism.

How seek the way which leadeth to our wishes? By renouncing our wishes. The crown of excellence is renunciation.

We need timeless principles to steer by in running our organizations and building our personal careers. We need high standards --- the ethics of excellence.

Once you decide that mediocrity is unthinkable, your only choices are excellence and quitting.

Has your work become very easy? Do you find you can do it with little effort? Has it ceased to impose any strain or fatigue upon you? Do you no longer feel loss of vitality after a long spell of it? Can you now do it as easy as water rolls off a duck's back? If so, look out! Do some stock-taking. Examine your output.... Work done with little effort is likely to yield little result. Every job can be done excellently or indifferently. Excellence necessitates effort-hard, sustained, concentrated effort.

If America wants to make "made in America" a symbol of excellence and worth. They have to make everything of high quality, otherwise the best.

I will not go so far as to say, with a living poet, that the world knows nothing of its greatest men; but there are forms of greatness, or at least of excellence, which "die and make no sign"; there are martyrs that miss the palm, but not the stake; heroes without the laurel, and conquerors without the triumph.

I think that's the coolest thing about our fans, they not only respect, but they demand, excellence from our guys.

The more we sympathize with excellence, the more we go out of self, the more we love, the broader and deeper is our personality.

All excellence is equally difficult.

Purists behave as if there was a vintage year when language achieved a measure of excellence which we should all strive to maintain. In fact, there was never such a year. The language of Chaucer's or Shakespeare's time was no better and no worse than that of our own - just different.

Excellence is doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.

Excellence does not begin in Washington.

That said, there are a few clear factors that determine the potential of a university to reach the highest levels of excellence. In the case of Harvard University, it was true that by the time of its tercentenary (300th anniversary of its founding) in 1936, Harvard had already achieved a reputation as a world-class institution. Harvard did not have the stature that it does today.

I would rather be the author of one original thought than conqueror of a hundred battles. Yet moral excellence is so much superior to intellectual, that I ought to esteem one virtue more valuable than a hundred original thoughts.

I've always had that obsessive will to win and a commitment to excellence.

Achieve some perfection [excellence] yourself, so that you may not fall into sorrow by seeing the perfection in others.

No publisher in America improved a paper so quickly on so grand a scale, took a paper that was marginal in qualities and brought it to excellence as Otis Chandler did.

Because of its independence of surface limitations and its superior speed the airplane is the offensive weapon par excellence.

'Dance to the Music' was just Sly Stone being his natural crazy self right from the beginning. The man was an original and his first AM hit was nothing if it wasn't the example per excellence of the Sly Stone music machine.

God is infinite, so His universe must be too. Thus is the excellence of God magnified and the greatness of His kingdom made manifest; He is glorified not in one, but in countless suns; not in a single earth, a single world, but in a thousand thousand, I say in an infinity of worlds.

The excellence of a thing is related to its proper function.

I look at my kids, who were born under a Black president, who hop around the living room naked and joyful, mimicking Simone Biles, and just think, Damn, they got some amazing role models of Black excellence.

There is no excellence uncoupled with difficulties.

Strive for excellence in few things, rather than good performance in many.

Excellence isn't an act, it's a habit

Hang on the walls of your mind the memory of your successes. Take counsel of your strength, not your weakness. Think of the good jobs you have done. For whenever excellence is recounted, it is increased.

In a well-written book we are presented with the maturest reflections, or the happiest flights of a mind of uncommon excellence. It is impossible that we can be much accustomed to such companions without attaining some resemblance to them.

True Excellence requires a worthy dream, a good Idea of how to realize it and the courage to risk failure to achieve it.

Live according to the ethics of excellence, and you can always stand proud. Pride - not vanity, but dignity and self-respect - should carry a lot of weight in helping you make decisions. Let pride help you decide.

Light is the photographic medium par excellence; it is to the photographer what words are to the writer; color and paint to the painter; wood, metal, stone, or clay to the sculptor.