John W. Gardner
The hallmark of our age is the tension between aspirations and sluggish institutions.
-John W. Gardner
age
Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.
-John W. Gardner
art
Leaders come in many forms, with many styles and diverse qualities. There are quiet leaders and leaders one can hear in the next county. Some find strength in eloquence, some in judgment, some in courage.
-John W. Gardner
courage
Much education today is monumentally ineffective. All too often we are giving young people cut flowers when we should be teaching them to grow their own plants.
-John W. Gardner
education
The ultimate goal of the educational system is to shift to the individual the burden of pursing his own education. This will not be a widely shared pursuit until we get over our odd conviction that education is what goes on in school buildings and nowhere else.
-John W. Gardner
education
I am entirely certain that twenty years from now we will look back at education as it is practiced in most schools today and wonder that we could have tolerated anything so primitive.
-John W. Gardner
education
Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.
-John W. Gardner
experience
One of the reasons people stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.
-John W. Gardner
failure
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.
-John W. Gardner
freedom
The society which scorns excellence in plumbing as a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy: neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water.
-John W. Gardner
good
It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.
-John W. Gardner
government
When one may pay out over two million dollars to presidential and Congressional campaigns, the U.S. government is virtually up for sale.
-John W. Gardner
government
We are all faced with a series of great opportunities - brilliantly disguised as insoluble problems.
-John W. Gardner
great
True happiness involves the full use of one's power and talents.
-John W. Gardner
happiness
History never looks like history when you are living through it.
-John W. Gardner
history
One of the reasons people stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.
-John W. Gardner
learning
Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.
-John W. Gardner
life
True happiness involves the full use of one's power and talents.
-John W. Gardner
motivational
For every talent that poverty has stimulated it has blighted a hundred.
-John W. Gardner
politics
When one may pay out over two million dollars to presidential and Congressional campaigns, the U.S. government is virtually up for sale.
-John W. Gardner
politics
True happiness involves the full use of one's power and talents.
-John W. Gardner
power
If you have some respect for people as they are, you can be more effective in helping them to become better than they are.
-John W. Gardner
respect
It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.
-John W. Gardner
respect
The society which scorns excellence in plumbing as a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy: neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water.
-John W. Gardner
society
Some people strengthen the society just by being the kind of people they are.
-John W. Gardner
society
Leaders come in many forms, with many styles and diverse qualities. There are quiet leaders and leaders one can hear in the next county. Some find strength in eloquence, some in judgment, some in courage.
-John W. Gardner
strength
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