Logo - Feel The Words

Excellency Quotes

The word excellency, in art, taste, and old titles.

The oldest sense of excellency shows up here as artistic quality, the intensity that makes lesser art fade next to it. A related line argues true excellency outlasts whatever fashionable humor first recommended a thing.

That which has not a real excellency and value in it self, entertains no longer than the giddy Humour which recommended it to us holds.

Quotes by Mary Astell

The excellency of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeable evaporate.

John Keats

A truly elegant taste is generally accompanied with excellency of heart.

Quotes by Henry Fielding

I have just returned from Arenas and feel very tired. His Excellency loaded me with a thousand honours; I have painted his portrait and that of his wife and boy and girl with unexpected success, for other artists had been...

Quotes by Francisco Goya

Art Quotes

I want to assure your excellency that I am occupying myself permanently and jointly with my team to achieve a solution as soon as possible to this crisis, the principal objective being the safeguarding of the health and life of...

Quotes by Alberto Fujimori

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "excellency" mean in the art-related quote?
It's used to describe intensity in art, the quality strong enough to make everything disagreeable simply evaporate around it.
Is excellency always about lasting value?
One quote argues exactly that, contrasting real excellency and value against things that only seem appealing because of a passing fashionable mood.
How does taste connect to excellency here?
A truly elegant taste is described as usually accompanied by excellency of heart, linking aesthetic judgment to something more like character.
Is "His Excellency" a title or a description in this collection?
It's a formal title, used in a painter's letter describing an encounter with a dignitary who commissioned portraits of his wife and boy.
Do any quotes suggest excellency is something you're born with?
Not directly - the quotes lean toward excellency being demonstrated through taste, art, and character, suggesting it's something a person proves capable of rather than simply inherits.

There's also a literal title in the mix - a painter writing home about His Excellency and a portrait of his wife and boy. Taken together, the quotes show a word capable of meaning both a virtue and a rank.