I find fault with my children because I like them and I want them to go places - uprightness and strength and courage and civil respect and anything that affects the probabilities of failure on the part of those that are closest to me, that concerns me - I find fault.

Rickey frames criticism not as hostility but as a form of invested care. Because he wants his children to “go places,” he scrutinizes traits he believes determine long-term success: upright character, resilience, courage, and basic civic respect. The repeated “I find fault” underscores a self-aware habit—he knows he is demanding—yet he justifies it as preventative, aimed at reducing “the probabilities of failure” for those closest to him. The quote also reflects Rickey’s broader reputation as a moralizing, character-centered leader: achievement is inseparable from conduct, and guidance may take the uncomfortable form of correction.