"There is an infinite difference between a little wrong and just right, between fairly good and the best, between mediocrity and superiority"
About this Quote
Marden draws a bright line between adequacy and excellence, arguing that the threshold between almost and right is not a small step but a leap. His phrase "infinite difference" is deliberate overstatement to make a practical point: at decisive moments, reality often respects exactness. A bridge either holds or fails; a pilot either clears the mountain or does not; a surgeon either nicks an artery or misses it by a hair. In craft and judgment, the last fraction toward "just right" is where consequences gather.
The progression he sketches moves from quality to character. "A little wrong" is about precision, "fairly good" about effort, and "mediocrity" about habit. Their opposites signal integrity and mastery. Excellence is not an occasional peak but a stance that refuses the comfortable plateau. The payoff is cumulative: small margins, repeated, become reputation, opportunity, and trust. The costs of settling, repeated, become erosion of skill and credibility.
Marden wrote amid the late 19th and early 20th centuries rise of industrial America, when efficiency, reliability, and self-made success were cultural imperatives. As founder of Success magazine and a leading voice in the New Thought movement, he championed discipline, optimism, and the shaping power of habits. The language here builds on that ethic, urging readers to treat standards as nonnegotiable, not for perfectionism's vanity but for the dignity of good work and the moral clarity of doing what is right.
There is a subtle warning as well. The phrase challenges the tendency to rationalize near misses as victory and to confuse motion with progress. Not every task deserves obsessive polish, but the crucial ones do, and it takes mature judgment to tell them apart. The call is to cultivate attention, finish, and responsibility so that at the critical junctures of life and work, the needle moves past "good enough" to undeniable excellence.
The progression he sketches moves from quality to character. "A little wrong" is about precision, "fairly good" about effort, and "mediocrity" about habit. Their opposites signal integrity and mastery. Excellence is not an occasional peak but a stance that refuses the comfortable plateau. The payoff is cumulative: small margins, repeated, become reputation, opportunity, and trust. The costs of settling, repeated, become erosion of skill and credibility.
Marden wrote amid the late 19th and early 20th centuries rise of industrial America, when efficiency, reliability, and self-made success were cultural imperatives. As founder of Success magazine and a leading voice in the New Thought movement, he championed discipline, optimism, and the shaping power of habits. The language here builds on that ethic, urging readers to treat standards as nonnegotiable, not for perfectionism's vanity but for the dignity of good work and the moral clarity of doing what is right.
There is a subtle warning as well. The phrase challenges the tendency to rationalize near misses as victory and to confuse motion with progress. Not every task deserves obsessive polish, but the crucial ones do, and it takes mature judgment to tell them apart. The call is to cultivate attention, finish, and responsibility so that at the critical junctures of life and work, the needle moves past "good enough" to undeniable excellence.
Quote Details
| Topic | Motivational |
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