Excellence Quotes
This quote is often misattributed to Aristotle. Durant was summarizing some connected statements by Aristotle as follows: “Excellence is an art won by training and habituation: we not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but rather have these because we have acted rightly; these virtues are formed in man by doing his actions; we are we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” See related Aristotle quote for additional context.
The phrase “city upon a hill” was first used by John Winthrop in 1630 which is probably taken from Matt. 5:14-16 “a city that is set on a hill.” See related quote. It was then used in a speech by President Kennedy with attribution to Winthrop. President Reagan used it without the attribution and embellished it by adding the adjective “shining” which many people thought was in the original Puritan statement. The Reagan video and audio clip has been so viewed so many times that people think the phrase originated with Reagan.
Paige was one of the baseball greats, but played most of his long career in the Negro League as baseball racism prevented him and other Blacks from competing.
About 200 years after Voltaire made this statement, Robert F Kennedy was quoted with a similar notion. See {624825}. However, both of these echo an old Russian proverb. See {615261}.
