Civic Engagement

Some of you may be scratching your heads and wondering from where the phrase "In the Arena" comes. "It's vaguely familiar," you're saying to yourself, "but I just can't seem to place it."

Question answered: the phrase "In the Arena" was coined by Teddy Roosevelt on the steps of the Sorbonne in 1910 when delivering the civic call-to-arms now known as "Citizenship in a Republic":

“It’s not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again...who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

For more information on Teddy Roosevelt, including a number of "firsts" that he bagged (one of my own having come last night when I wrote my first blog entry), visit here.