"No serious-minded man should have time for the mediocre in any phase of his living"
About this Quote
Austere on the surface, this is really a management philosophy smuggled into a moral commandment. Penney isn’t just telling you to like better art or demand better service; he’s insisting that mediocrity is a kind of theft. It steals the one resource that can’t be replenished: time. Framed that way, “serious-minded” becomes a gatekeeping label. If you tolerate the average, you’re not merely unselective-you’re unserious, undisciplined, unworthy of the ambitions modern life supposedly requires.
The wording gives the game away. “Any phase of his living” expands the doctrine from the office into the home, taste, friendships, habits. It’s an early 20th-century businessman’s totalizing view of character: the good consumer and the good citizen are the same person, and both are trained by standards. Penney built a retail empire on dependable, middle-class respectability; the irony is that his stores served the very “mediocre” mainstream he warns against. That tension is the subtext: he doesn’t mean “avoid ordinary people.” He means “avoid ordinary effort.” Raise the bar, keep it raised, and the market-and your life-will reward you.
It also betrays a distinctly masculine, Protestant-inflected ethic of the era. The “man” in the sentence isn’t incidental; it’s a model of authority whose seriousness is measured by efficiency and self-command. The line works because it flatters: it invites you to join an elite defined not by birth but by standards, and then dares you to live like you belong there.
The wording gives the game away. “Any phase of his living” expands the doctrine from the office into the home, taste, friendships, habits. It’s an early 20th-century businessman’s totalizing view of character: the good consumer and the good citizen are the same person, and both are trained by standards. Penney built a retail empire on dependable, middle-class respectability; the irony is that his stores served the very “mediocre” mainstream he warns against. That tension is the subtext: he doesn’t mean “avoid ordinary people.” He means “avoid ordinary effort.” Raise the bar, keep it raised, and the market-and your life-will reward you.
It also betrays a distinctly masculine, Protestant-inflected ethic of the era. The “man” in the sentence isn’t incidental; it’s a model of authority whose seriousness is measured by efficiency and self-command. The line works because it flatters: it invites you to join an elite defined not by birth but by standards, and then dares you to live like you belong there.
Quote Details
| Topic | Work Ethic |
|---|
More Quotes by James
Add to List
