A Quote by Benjamin E. Mays

Not failure, but low aim is sin.

Benjamin E. Mays

Quote Topics

Failure Aim Low Sin

Quote Author

Benjamin E. Mays
American - Educator
August 1, 1895 - 1984

Sometimes people have to remind you to aim high. Most of us are afraid of aiming high for fear of failure and our biggest failure is that we aim too low.

Shai Agassi

Don't fear failure. Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.

Bruce Lee

Not failure, but low aim, is crime.

James Russell Lowell

Failure is not the crime. Low aim is.

John Wooden

Low aim, not failure, is the crime.

Bruce Lee

The tragedy of this life is not failure, but low aim.

Benjamin E. Mays

The aims of these three groups are entirely irreconcilable. The aim of the High is to remain where they are. The aim of the Middle is to change places with the High. The aim of the Low, when they have an aim-for it is an abiding characteristic of the Low that they are too much crushed by drudgery to be more than intermittently conscious of anything outside their daily lives -is to abolish all distinctions and create a society in which all men shall be equal.

George Orwell

Greatly begin. Though thou have time, but for a line, be that sublime. Not failure, but low aim is crime.

James Russell Lowell

The tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn't a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream...It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim is sin.

Benjamin E. Mays

Despair is the price one pays for setting oneself an impossible aim. It is, one is told, the unforgivable sin, but it is a sin the corrupt or evil man never practices. He always has hope. He never reaches the freezing-point of knowing absolute failure. Only the man of goodwill carries always in his heart this capacity for damnation.

Graham Greene

Fail your way forward. Recognize that Ready, fire, aim is superior to ready, aim, aim, aim. Straightforward trial and error produces better results than endless vacillating. If you're afraid to make decisions and act on them in the face of ambiguity and uncertainty, get a job. Failure's lessons are essential to success.