Standards Quotes

No one can tell me what is a good cigar--for me. I am the only judge... There are no standards--no real standards. Each man's preference is the only standard for him, the only one which he can accept, the only one which can command him.

There is nothing more frustrating than a good example.

Any policy is a success by sufficiently low standards and a failure by sufficiently high standards.

The standard that measures two things is something different from either. You are, in fact, comparing them both with some Real Morality, admitting that there is such a thing as a real Right, independent of what people think, and that some people's ideas get nearer to that real Right than others.

I have a simple taste, only the best.

The stricter standards and independent, often conclusive, evidence in the physical sciences cannot be generalized to intellectual activity as a whole, even though the aura of scientific processes and results is often appropriated by other intellectuals.

The painter will produce pictures of little merit if he takes the works of others as his standard.

The difference between MUST & SHOULD is the life you want and the life you have.

No one can be really esteemed accomplished who does not greatly surpass what is usually met with.

Whenever people talk glibly of a need to achieve educational "excellence," I think of what an improvement it would be if our public schools could just achieve mediocrity.

Bad artists always admire each other's work. They call it being large-minded and free from prejudice. But a truly great artist cannot conceive of life being shown, or beauty fashioned, under any conditions other than those he has selected.

Sometimes our best is simply not enough.... We have to do what is required.

Your life experience will never far exceed the expectations of your peers, because to stay connected to them there is an unconscious contract that says we're going to be within this range of each other. Now, on the other hand, if for some reason your friends have a higher expectation for life than you do, just to stay on the team you've got to raise your standard.

I saw that bad handwriting should be regarded as a sign of an imperfect education.

Raising the standard of the work, not complaining about somebody not voting.

I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.

Who you spend time with is who you become! Change your life by consciously choosing to surround yourself with people with higher standards!

Just make sure you never do less than your best

Leaders must live by higher standards than their followers.

Art finds her own perfection within, and not outside of, herself. She is not to be judged by any external standard of resemblance.

Popularity is not a gurantee of quality.

We don't settle for anything less than excellence.

A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line.

I do not want you ever to initiate any action for any refunds of taxes without first consulting me and presenting the matter fully to me so that I may judge whether it is an honorable and ethical action to take, not simply legally, but according to my own personal standards.

I try to deliver because I don't believe that people are deliverin' the same quality of albums.

I am easily satisfied with the very best.

If you want to change your life you have to raise your standards.

It's all right for a perfect stranger to kiss your hand as long as he's perfect.

Set high standards for yourself and don't settle for anything less. You are the best judge of yourself and your capabilities.

I don't want to please everybody. I'd get a little worried if I did something and everybody was pleased with it.

The most important thing was the creation of a... a standard, where hundreds of companies build hardware that can all run the same software.

Golf asks something of a man. It makes one loathe mediocrity. It seems to say, "If you are going to keep company with me, don't embarrass me.

I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other.

One woman is fair, yet I am well; another is wise, yet I am well; another virtuous, yet I am well; but till all graces be in one woman, one woman shall not come in my grace.

The mass never comes up to the standard of its best member, but on the contrary degrades itself to a level with the lowest.

I absolutely cannot see how one can later make up for having failed to go to a good school at the proper time. For this is what distinguishes the hard school as a good school from all others: that much is demanded; and sternly demanded; that the good, even the exceptional, is demanded as the norm; that praise is rare, that indulgence is nonexistent; that blame is apportioned sharply, objectively, without regard for talent or antecedents. What does one learn in a hard school? Obeying and commanding.

Again, the great number of cultivated men keep each other up to a high standard. The habit of meeting well-read and knowing men teaches the art of omission and selection.

Whatever you really want, wants don't get met consistently, standards do.

I have watched constantly that in our work the highest moral and spiritual standards are upheld, whether my productions deal with fable or with stories of living action.

What is adequacy? Adequacy is no standard at all.

Praise invariably implies a reference to a higher standard.

'Good English' is whatever educated people talk; so that what is good in one place or time would not be so in another.

For the person that wrote that, were they involved with anything last year that was as culturally significant as the Yeezus tour or that album? ... The bar was terrible, and the wedding planner didn't approve it with me. I was having issues with this wedding planner the entire time on approvals, and I get there and they threw some weird plastic bar there.

The troops may whine and moan, but when they meet the standard, there's a sense of pride.

Every first-rate editor I have ever heard of reads, edits and rewrites every word that goes into his publication.... Good editors are not 'permissive'; they do not let their colleagues do 'their thing'; they make sure that everybody does the 'paper's thing.' A good, let alone a great editor is an obsessive autocrat with a whim of iron, who rewrites and rewrites, cuts and slashes, until every piece is exactly the way he thinks it should have been done.

If you don't set a baseline standard for what you'll accept in life, you'll find it's easy to slip into behaviours and attitudes or a quality of life that's far below what you deserve.

I find it harder and harder every day to live up to my blue china.

As far as I'm concerned, it's a damned shame that a field as potentially dynamic and vital as journalism should be overrun with dullards, bums, and hacks, hag-ridden with myopia, apathy, and complacence, and generally stuck in a bog of stagnant mediocrity.

Always fight for quality, whether giving or receiving.

You know, sometimes I'll go to an 8th-grade graduation and there's all that pomp and circumstance and gowns and flowers. And I think to myself, it's just 8th grade ... An 8th-grade education doesn't cut it today. Let's give them a handshake and tell them to get their butts back in the library!

I can't raise the bar of others if I haven't raised the bar for myself.

Stop bullshitting yourself. You're not satisfied. You lowered your standards and are settling for a lot less.

I wish the stage were as narrow as the wire of a tighrope dancer so that no incompetent would dare step upon it.

Till all grace be in one woman, one woman shall not come in my grace.

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.

We tend to get in life what we are willing to tolerate.

Ladies, your self-worth is like your price tag. If he's not offering what your worth, he can't have you. No bargains, no sales.

The big problem in the long process of dumbing down the schools is that you can reach a point of no return. How are parents who never received a decent education themselves to recognize that their children are not getting a decent education?

...I'm not going to be able to make things that I can call Kanye West just by making T-shirts.

If you are going to keep company with me, don't embarrass me.