Quotes About Greatness

The left think they've got a monopoly on this silly idea that we are a nation of immigrants, America's greatness is traceable to its immigrants. I'm sorry. I don't buy that as a stand-alone idea anyway because really what they're trying to say with that is that America's greatness is due to America's diversity, and that has not a thing to do with it. American Greatness is because of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and our country.

Do you recall, from your childhood on, how very much this life of yours has longed for greatness? I see it now, how from the vantage point of greatness it longs for even greater greatness. That is why it does not let up being difficult, but that is also why it will not cease to grow.

There is no way to greatness. Greatness is the way.

The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality, even occasional greatness will destroy a man.

Few people have courage enough to appear as good as they really are. Most people confuse greatness with power, despite the fact that greatness has nothing to do with power.

Many are so preoccupied with what others think it defines their existence. When we fixate externally, it keeps us from truly knowing ourselves and our destiny. Most [people] fear looking inward for worry they won't find greatness, but when you stop allowing others to define your worth, you'll see—greatness exists in us all, waiting to be
 expressed

It is dangerous to explain too clearly to man how like he is to the animals without pointing out his greatness. It is also dangerous to make too much of his greatness without his vileness. It is still more dangerous to leave him in ignorance of both, but it is most valuable to represent both to him. Man must not be allowed to believe that he is equal either to animals or to angels, nor to be unaware of either, but he must know both.

There is no such thing as a little country. The greatness of a people is no more determined by their numbers than the greatness of a man is by his height.

It is of dangerous consequence to represent to man how near he is to the level of beasts, without showing him at the same time his greatness. It is likewise dangerous to let him see his greatness without his meanness. It is more dangerous yet to leave him ignorant of either; but very beneficial that he should be made sensible of both.

A man who has once perceived, however temporarily and however briefly, what makes greatness of soul, can no longer be happy if he allows himself to be petty, self-seeking, troubled by trivial misfortunes, dreading what fate may have in store for him. The man capable of greatness of soul will open wide the windows of his mind, letting the winds blow freely upon it from every portion of the universe.

Whatever there is of greatness in the United States, or indeed in any other country, is due to labor. The laborer is the author of all greatness and wealth. Without labor there would be no government, no leading class, and nothing to preserve.

Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he or she is in. That person must reflect what is projected upon him or her.

One of the marks of true greatness is the ability to develop greatness in others.

Take criticism, smash it into dust. Add color and use it to paint breathtaking images of unicorns frolicking through endless fields of greatness.

Any base heart can devise means of vileness, and affix the ugly shapings of its own fancy to the actions of those around him; but it requires loftiness of mind, and the heaven-born spirit of virtue, to imagine greatness where it is not, and to deck the sordid objects of nature in the beautiful robes of loveliness and light.

people who personify the system are indeed well known for not being what they seem to be; they have achieved greatness by embracing a level of reality lower than that of the most insignificant individual life- and everyone knows it.

Greatness is not manifested by unlimited pragmatism, which places such a high premium on the end justifying any means and any methods

Greatness as a leader is measured in part by your willingness to accept daunting challenges. Achieving tough goals requires practicing the secret of commitment: Risk all to win all.

The highest greatness, surviving time and stone, is that which proceeds from the soul of man. Monarchs and cabinets, generals and admirals, with the pomp of court and the circumstance of war, in the lapse of time disappear from sight; but the pioneers of truth, though poor and lowly, especially those whose example elevates human nature, and teaches the rights of man, so that "a government of the people, by the people, for the people, may not perish from the earth;" such a harbinger can never be forgotten, and their renown spreads co-extensive with the cause they served so well.

The greatness of Americans is that we are mosaic - we are diverse.

I'm not looking forward to a specific person per se; I'm just excited to meet everyone. I respect greatness and I'm just going to soak in anyone I meet.

Recycle your pain, allow your pain to reach you to greatness.

What is greatness? I will answer: it is the capacity to live by the three fundamental values of John Galt: reason, purpose, self-esteem.

There are people who are so presumptuous that they know no other way to praise a greatness that they publicly admire than by representing it as a preliminary stage and bridge leading to themselves.

We will be relentless in our pursuit for perfection. We won't ever be perfect - but in the process we will achieve greatness.

My life is basically a big chunk of greatness.

Greatness is not found in possessions, power, position, or prestige. It is discovered in goodness, humility, service, and character.

The tomb is the pedestal of greatness. I make a distinction between God's great and the king's great.

It was better for me when I could imagine greatness in others, even if it wasn't always there.

With eyes of faith consider the greatness of your mission and the wonderful amount of good which you can accomplish.

Great men, great events, great epochs, it has been said, grow as we recede from them; and the rate at which they grow in the estimation of men is in some sort a measure of their greatness.

I can't stand satisfaction. To me, greatness comes from that quest for perfection.

I have touch'd the highest point of all my greatness, And from that full meridian of my glory I haste now to my setting.

Every luminary in the constellation of human greatness, like the stars, comes out in the darkness to shine with the reflected light of God.

The NHL's opinion of itself is so high.... Let them get drunk on their greatness. We'll see how many Euros look our way.

Only men are capable of aesthetic greatness.

I do not admire a virtue like valour when it is pushed to excess, if I do not see at the same time the excess of the opposite virtue, as one does in Epaminondas, who displayed extreme valour and extreme benevolence. For otherwise it is not an ascent, but a fall. We do not display our greatness by placing ourselves at one extremity, but rather by being at both at the same time, and filling up the whole of the space between them.

There is within each of us a divine spark of greatness. Who knows of what we are capable if we only try?

Some men […] choose to seek greatness, while others are forced to it. It is always better to choose than to be forced. A man who is forced is never completely his own master. He must dance on the strings of those who forced him.

America has always been greatest when we dared to be great. We can reach for greatness again. We can follow our dreams to distant stars, living and working in space for peaceful, economic, and scientific gain. Tonight, I am directing NASA to develop a permanently manned space station, and to do it within a decade.

I don't confuse greatness with perfection. To be great anyhow is the higher achievement.

Greatness is a lot of small things done well, stacked up on each other.

Putin wants to reestablish Russian greatness, not as the Cold War, but in 19th century empire terms.

In the quiet of this day may you know the greatness of your spirit and may your hopes fly on the wings of possibility.

Immediately upon the fall, the mind of man shrank from its primitive greatness and expandedness, to an exceeding smallness and contractedness... Before, his soul was under the government of the noble principles of divine love, whereby it was enlarged to the comprehensiveness of all his fellow creatures and their welfare... [But] sin, like some powerful astringent, contracted his soul to the very small dimensions of selfishness, and God was forsaken, and man retired within himself, and became totally governed by narrow and selfish principles and feelings.

Anything which elevates the mind is sublime. Greatness of matter, space, power, virtue or beauty, are all sublime.

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

You do not need to import greatness from another; you just need to act on your own.