"Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself"

-Henry Ward Beecher

This quote is a really important quote. It means that if people expect something of you, you should exceed their standards and surpass them. An example of this would be a teacher assigning an essay. The essay needs to be a page long. You should make a higher standard for yourself and do something the teacher doesn't expect you to do. Instead of writing a page write more than a page, write 3 pages. This quote also says to never excuse yourself. This means that you shouldn't blame someone else for you failures. If you failed it means you didn't try hard enough. You should never make excuses for yourself. An example of this would be someone trying to pass a class. They blame the teacher for not teaching correctly but, in reality it would be his/her fault for not paying attention or doing the work. I agree with what this quote says. You should make standards for yourself that other people would not expect of you. You should also never make excuses on why you failed, you should instead keep trying and fix the mistakes that you made.