
Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.

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

A prime function of a leader is to keep hope alive.

Storybook happiness involves every form of pleasant thumb-twiddling; true happiness involves the full use of one's powers and talents.

The world loves talent but pays off on character.

Renewal is not just innovation and change. It is also the process of bringing the results of change into line with our purposes.

The creative individual is particularly gifted in seeing the gap between what is and what could be.

Some people strengthen the society just by being the kind of people they are.

If you have some respect for people as they are, you can be more effective in helping them to become better than they are.

All excellence involves discipline and tenacity of purpose.

True happiness involves the full use of one's power and talents.

Our problem is not to find better values but to be faithful to those we profess.

One man interacting creatively with others can move the world.
![John W. Gardner quotes: Perhaps the most striking feature of the [nonprofit] sector is its relative freedom from constraints and its resulting pluralism. John W. Gardner quotes: Perhaps the most striking feature of the [nonprofit] sector is its relative freedom from constraints and its resulting pluralism.](https://www.wisefamousquotes.com/images/john-w-gardner-quotes-1088248.jpg)
Perhaps the most striking feature of the [nonprofit] sector is its relative freedom from constraints and its resulting pluralism.

Life is an endless process of self-discovery.

We get richer and richer in filthier and filthier communities until we reach a final state of affluent misery - crocus on a garbage heap.

It's a staggering transition for high school students that found they could study five hours a week and make As and Bs.

One of the reasons mature people stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.

History never looks like history when you are living through it.

The cynic says, 'One man can't do anything.' I say, 'Only one man can do anything.'

Paralysis of leadership is due in part to the unseen grip of the special interests.

It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.

When one may pay out over two million dollars to presidential and Congressional campaigns, the U.S. government is virtually up for sale.

To sensible men, every day is a day of reckoning.

When hiring key employees, there are only two qualities to look for: judgement and taste. Almost everything else can be bought by the yard.

Whoever I am, or whatever I am doing, some kind of excellence is within my reach.

We cannot have islands of excellence in a sea of slovenly indifference to standards.