Quotes and Sayings about Morality
"Morality is a private and costly luxury."
- Henry B. Adams
(Related: Morality, Luxury)
"The essence of immorality is the tendency to make an exception of myself."
- Jane Addams
"To say that authority, whether secular or religious, supplies no ground for morality is not to deny the obvious fact that it supplies a sanction."
- Joseph Addison
(Related: Morality, Authority, Fact, Obvious, Religious)
"The type of fig leaf which each culture employs to cover its social taboos offers a twofold description of its morality. It reveals that certain unacknowledged behavior exists and it suggests the form that such behavior takes."
- Freda Adler
(Related: Morality, Behavior, Culture)
"Men are more accountable for their motives, than for anything else; and primarily, morality consists in the motives, that is in the affections."
- Archibald Alexander
(Related: Men, Morality, Motives)
"If we allow the consideration of heathen morality and heathen religion to absolve us from the duty of preaching the gospel we are really deposing Christ from His throne in our own souls."
- Roland Allen
(Related: Religion, Morality, Christ, Consideration, Duty, Preaching)
"The only immorality is not to do what one has to do when one has to do it."
- Jean Anouilh
"The true meaning of religion is thus, not simply morality, but morality touched by emotion."
- Matthew Arnold
(Related: Religion, Morality, Emotion, Meaning)
"We do not look in our great cities for our best morality."
- Jane Austen
(Related: Morality, Cities)
"We learned in World War II that no single nation holds a monopoly on wisdom, morality or right to power, but that we must fight for the weak and promote democracy."
- Joe Baca
(Related: War, Power, Wisdom, Morality, Democracy, Fight, Nation, Right, World, World war)
"Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely conceives it, wants it, and loves it."
- Mikhail Bakunin
(Related: Morality, Dignity, Freedom)
"But the relationship of morality and power is a very subtle one. Because ultimately power without morality is no longer power."
- James Baldwin
(Related: Power, Morality)
"Organizations endure, however, in proportion to the breadth of the morality by which they are governed. Thus the endurance of organization depends upon the quality of leadership; and that quality derives from the breadth of the morality upon which it rests."
- Chester Irving Barnard
(Related: Leadership, Quality, Morality, Endurance)
"To eat steak rare... represents both a nature and a morality."
- Roland Barthes
(Related: Nature, Morality)
"The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil."
- Georges Bataille
(Related: Life, Morality, Evil, Light, Opposition, Questioning)
"Every young man would do well to remember that all successful business stands on the foundation of morality."
- Henry Ward Beecher
(Related: Business, Morality, Successful, Man)
"For children to take morality seriously they must be in the presence of adults who take morality seriously. And with their own eyes they must see adults take morality seriously."
- William Bennett
(Related: Morality, Children, Eyes)
"Modern societies march towards morality in proportion as they leave religion behind."
- Paul Bert
(Related: Religion, Morality, March)
"Academe, n.: An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. Academy, n.: A modern school where football is taught."
- Ambrose Bierce
(Related: Morality, Football, Philosophy, School)
"Morality may consist solely in the courage of making a choice."
- Leon Blum
(Related: Morality, Courage, Choice, May)
"The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children."
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
(Related: Society, Morality, Children)
"In a constitutional democracy the moral content of law must be given by the morality of the framer or legislator, never by the morality of the judge."
- Robert Bork
(Related: Morality, Content, Democracy, Law)
"I like the English. They have the most rigid code of immorality in the world."
- Malcolm Bradbury
(Related: English, World)
"There is more criticism of puritanism, and more distance from Christian morality, than there has been before."
- Susie Bright
(Related: Morality, Christian, Criticism)
"Conventionality is not morality."
- Charlotte Bronte
(Related: Morality, Conventionality)
"Every man should follow the bent of his nature in art and letters, always provided that he does not offend against the rules of morality and good taste."
- Thomas Edward Brown
(Related: Art, Nature, Morality, Letters, Man, Rules, Taste)
"Morality becomes hypocrisy if it means accepting mothers' suffering or dying in connection with unwanted pregnancies and illegal abortions and unwanted children."
- Gro Harlem Brundtland
(Related: Morality, Children, Connection, Dying, Hypocrisy, Mothers, Suffering)
"The Leadership Training Institute of America trains and equips young men and women to be leaders with high standards of personal morality and integrity."
- Michael Burgess
(Related: Leadership, Men, Women, Morality, America, Integrity, Training)
"Morality is the custom of one's country and the current feeling of one's peers."
- Samuel Butler
(Related: Morality, Country, Custom, Feeling)
"The 'morality of compromise' sounds contradictory. Compromise is usually a sign of weakness, or an admission of defeat. Strong men don't compromise, it is said, and principles should never be compromised."
- Andrew Carnegie
(Related: Men, Compromise, Defeat, Principles, Weakness)
"Art, like morality, consists in drawing the line somewhere."
- Gilbert K. Chesterton
(Related: Art, Morality)
"When morality comes up against profit, it is seldom that profit loses."
- Shirley Chisholm
(Related: Morality, Profit)
"A man does what he must - in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures - and that is the basis of all human morality."
- Winston Churchill
(Related: Morality, Consequences, Man, Obstacles)
"The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion."
- Arthur C. Clarke
(Related: History, Religion, Morality, Mankind, May, Tragedy)
"A government for the people must depend for its success on the intelligence, the morality, the justice, and the interest of the people themselves."
- Grover Cleveland
(Related: Government, Success, Intelligence, Morality, People, Interest, Justice)
"While some of them acknowledge the obligation of natural morality in their mode of conducting their cases, and preserve their individual character as gentlemen, there are others who acknowledge no law, human or divine, but the law of Scotland."
- George Combe
(Related: Morality, Character, Gentlemen, Law, Obligation, Scotland)
"But the imposition of morality onto science, - where it does not belong - has become rampant in recent years."
- Bill Condon
(Related: Science, Morality, Years)
"Observe decorum, and it will open a path to morality."
- Mason Cooley
(Related: Morality, Open, Will)
"There is no morality in war. Morality is the privilege of those judging from the distance. War is only death and destruction."
- John Cory
(Related: Death, War, Morality, Destruction, Privilege)
"Ordinary morality is only for ordinary people."
- Aleister Crowley
(Related: Morality, People)
"Modern morality and manners suppress all natural instincts, keep people ignorant of the facts of nature and make them fighting drunk on bogey tales."
- Aleister Crowley
(Related: Nature, Morality, People, Facts, Fighting, Manners)
"Commerce is against morality. Morality is going to lose every time."
- Robin Day
(Related: Time, Morality, Commerce)
"Western civilization, unfortunately, does not link knowledge and morality but rather, it connects knowledge and power and makes them equivalent."
- Vine Deloria, Jr.
(Related: Power, Morality, Civilization, Knowledge)
"Some people talk of morality, and some of religion, but give me a little snug property."
- Maria Edgeworth
(Related: Religion, Morality, People, Property, Talk)
"There are two sorts of hypocrites: ones that are deceived with their outward morality and external religion; and the others are those that are deceived with false discoveries and elevation; which often cry down works, and men's own righteousness, and."
- Jonathan Edwards
(Related: Men, Religion, Morality, Righteousness)
"Morality is of the highest importance - but for us, not for God."
- Albert Einstein
(Related: God, Morality, Importance)
"Force always attracts men of low morality."
- Albert Einstein
(Related: Men, Morality, Force)
"Of woman as a real human being, with sexual needs and sexual responsibilities, morality has often known nothing."
- Havelock Ellis
(Related: Morality, Being, Needs, Nothing, Woman)
"I learned at a very early age, the easiest thing in the world is to tell the truth, and then you don't have to remember what you said. It has nothing to do with morality, just remembering what you said."
- Robert Evans
(Related: Age, Morality, Truth, Nothing, World)
"God created the family to provide the maximum love and support and morality and example that one can imagine."
- Jerry Falwell
(Related: Family, Love, God, Morality, Example, Support)
"It is almost impossible to imagine that any one could be so insensible to the high morality of Mr. Mill's character as to suggest to him any course of conduct that was not entirely upright and consistent."
- Millicent Fawcett
(Related: Morality, Character)
"Here is true immorality: ignorance and stupidity; the devil is nothing but this. His name is Legion."
- Gustave Flaubert
(Related: Devil, Ignorance, Name, Nothing, Stupidity)
"I have always maintained that society has no business dictating morality."
- Peter Fonda
(Related: Business, Society, Morality)
"My commitment to the security and future of Israel is based upon basic morality as well as enlightened self-interest. Our role in supporting Israel honors our own heritage."
- Gerald R. Ford
(Related: Morality, Commitment, Future, Israel, Security, Self)
"The more highly public life is organized the lower does its morality sink."
- E. M. Forster
(Related: Life, Morality, Public)
"To deny the freedom of the will is to make morality impossible."
- James Anthony Froude
(Related: Morality, Freedom, Will)
"I reject any religious doctrine that does not appeal to reason and is in conflict with morality."
- Mohandas Gandhi
(Related: Morality, Conflict, Doctrine, Reason, Religious)
"Morality is contraband in war."
- Mohandas Gandhi
(Related: War, Morality)
"Morality is the basis of things and truth is the substance of all morality."
- Mohandas Gandhi
(Related: Morality, Truth)
"Morality which depends upon the helplessness of a man or woman has not much to recommend it. Morality is rooted in the purity of our hearts."
- Mohandas Gandhi
(Related: Morality, Man, Purity, Woman)
"There is no morality by instinct. There is no social salvation in the end without taking thought; without mastery of logic and application of logic to human experience."
- Katharine Fullerton Gerould
(Related: Experience, Morality, Thought, End, Instinct, Logic, Salvation)
"Morality and its victim, the mother - what a terrible picture! Is there indeed anything more terrible, more criminal, than our glorified sacred function of motherhood?"
- Emma Goldman
(Related: Mother, Morality, Motherhood)
"Each man must grant himself the emotions that he needs and the morality that suits him."
- Remy de Gourmont
(Related: Morality, Emotions, Man, Needs)
"I just think people should find the music that helps them through the day and enjoy that. I've never felt like, if somebody does or doesn't like what I'm doing, it's a morality issue."
- Amy Grant
(Related: Music, Morality, People, Day)
"I don't believe in morality in architecture."
- Michael Graves
(Related: Architecture, Morality)
"Morality comes with the sad wisdom of age, when the sense of curiosity has withered."
- Graham Greene
(Related: Wisdom, Age, Morality, Curiosity, Sense)
"I guess it was but I think peoples morality has changed. It's gotten more liberal and more diverse and even in a sense much more fundamental, you take the fundamental religious right in this country, its got to go back about 50 years."
- Larry Hagman
(Related: Morality, Country, Liberal, Religious, Right, Sense, Years)
"Fundamentalists are panicked by the apparent disintegration of the family, the disappearance of certainty and the decay of morality. Fear leads them to ask, if we cannot trust the Bible, what can we trust?"
- Garrett Hardin
(Related: Trust, Family, Morality, Fear, Bible, Certainty)
"A technical solution may be defined as one that requires a change only in the techniques of the natural sciences, demanding little or nothing in the way of change in human values or ideas of morality."
- Garrett Hardin
(Related: Change, Morality, Ideas, Values, May, Nothing, Solution)
"The Christian churches were offered two things: the spirit of Jesus and the idiotic morality of Paul, and they rejected the higher inspiration... Following Paul, we have turned the goodness of love into a fiend and degraded the crowning impulse of our being into a capital sin."
- Frank Harris
(Related: Love, Morality, Inspiration, Christian, Being, Churches, Goodness, Sin, Spirit)
"Morality and expediency coincide more than the cynics allow."
- Roy Hattersley
(Related: Morality, Expediency)
"Every man, in his own opinion, forms an exception to the ordinary rules of morality."
- William Hazlitt
(Related: Morality, Man, Opinion, Rules)
"It has been wisely observed by the greatest of modern thinkers that mankind has progressed more rapidly in every other respect than in morality."
- Lafcadio Hearn
(Related: Morality, Mankind, Respect)
"Do you not see, first, that - as a mental abstract - physical force is directly opposed to morality; and secondly, that it practically drives out of existence the moral forces?"
- Auberon Herbert
(Related: Morality, Existence, First, Force)
"Respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality."
- Frank Herbert
(Related: Morality, Truth, Being, Respect)
"All religions have based morality on obedience, that is to say, on voluntary slavery. That is why they have always been more pernicious than any political organization. For the latter makes use of violence, the former - of the corruption of the will."
- Alexander Herzen
(Related: Morality, Corruption, Obedience, Slavery, Violence, Will)
"Money motivates neither the best people, nor the best in people. It can move the body and influence the mind, but it cannot touch the heart or move the spirit; that is reserved for belief, principle, and morality."
- Dee Hock
(Related: Money, Morality, People, Heart, Belief, Body, Influence, Mind, Spirit)
"Religion without morality is a superstition and a curse, and morality without religion is impossible."
- Mark Hopkins
(Related: Religion, Morality, Superstition)
"My parents were pretty lenient with me. But, they gave me morality while I was growing up. They taught me the difference between right and wrong."
- Mark Hoppus
(Related: Morality, Difference, Growing up, Parents, Pretty, Right, Wrong)
"None of us can boast about the morality of our ancestors. The record does not show that Adam and Eve were ever married."
- Edgar Watson Howe
(Related: Morality)
"Indigestion is charged by God with enforcing morality on the stomach."
- Victor Hugo
(Related: God, Morality, Indigestion)
"However great an evil immorality may be, we must not forget that it is not without its beneficial consequences. It is only through extremes that men can arrive at the middle path of wisdom and virtue."
- Wilhelm von Humboldt
(Related: Men, Wisdom, Virtue, Consequences, Evil, Extremes, Forget, May)
"The rules of morality are not the conclusion of our reason."
- David Hume
(Related: Morality, Reason, Rules)
"Teach a child what is wise, that is morality. Teach him what is wise and beautiful, that is religion!"
- Thomas Huxley
(Related: Morality)
"Understand that sexuality is as wide as the sea. Understand that your morality is not law. Understand that we are you. Understand that if we decide to have sex whether safe, safer, or unsafe, it is our decision and you have no rights in our lovemaking."
- Derek Jarman
(Related: Sex, Morality, Decision, Rights, Law, Sea, Sexuality)
"Philosophy as practice does not mean its restriction to utility or applicability, that is, to what serves morality or produces serenity of soul."
- Karl Jaspers
(Related: Morality, Soul, Philosophy, Practice, Serenity)
"Truth is certainly a branch of morality and a very important one to society."
- Thomas Jefferson
(Related: Society, Morality, Truth)
"Money, not morality, is the principle commerce of civilized nations."
- Thomas Jefferson
(Related: Money, Morality, Commerce, Nations)
"And it is to rock the soul and lead the person to immorality, corruption - to forget their prayers, to forget their God. And thus the world has partaken of the spirit of the Negro race, accepting their ways."
- Warren Jeffs
(Related: God, Soul, Corruption, Forget, Race, Spirit, World)
"Well, there's a morality in that you want your work to be good, I suppose."
- Donald Judd
(Related: Work, Morality, Want)
"I think most of the art now is involved with a denial of any kind of absolute morality, or general morality."
- Donald Judd
(Related: Art, Morality, Denial, Now)
"Deterrence itself is not a preeminent value; the primary values are safety and morality."
- Herman Kahn
(Related: Morality, Values, Safety)
"Morality is not the doctrine of how we may make ourselves happy, but how we may make ourselves worthy of happiness."
- Immanuel Kant
(Related: Happiness, Morality, Doctrine, May)
"Democracy without morality is impossible."
- Jack Kemp
(Related: Morality, Democracy)
"Our enemy of international terrorism respects no laws of warfare or morality, and its individual members take innocent lives, just to create chaos for news cameras."
- Mark Kennedy
(Related: Morality, Chaos, Enemy, Laws, News, Terrorism)
"He was a crystal of morality among our scientists."
- Nikita Khrushchev
(Related: Morality, Scientists)
"For us, universal values such as justice, morality and peace cannot be disputed and it is for this reason that we pursue the restoration of historical truth."
- Robert Kocharian
(Related: Peace, Morality, Truth, Values, Justice, Reason)
"I believe that my art gets across the point that I'm in this morality theater trying to help the underdog, and I'm speaking socially here, showing concern and making psychological and philosophical statements for the underdog."
- Jeff Koons
(Related: Art, Morality, Concern, Help, Theater, Trying)
"I love the gallery, the arena of representation. It's a commercial world, and morality is based generally around economics, and that's taking place in the art gallery."
- Jeff Koons
(Related: Art, Love, Morality, Economics, World)
"Morality is a venereal disease. Its primary stage is called virtue; its secondary stage, boredom; its tertiary stage, syphilis."
- Karl Kraus
(Related: Morality, Virtue, Boredom, Disease)
"Christian morality prefers remorse to precede lust, and then lust not to follow."
- Karl Kraus
(Related: Morality, Christian, Lust, Remorse)
"A novel that does not uncover a hitherto unknown segment of existence is immoral. Knowledge is the novel's only morality."
- Milan Kundera
(Related: Morality, Knowledge, Existence)
"Morality is not only taught; it is caught."
- Neil Kurshan
(Related: Morality)
"Relationships do not preclude issues of morality."
- Jhumpa Lahiri
(Related: Morality, Relationships)
"It is an accepted commonplace in psychology that the spiritual level of people acting as a crowd is far lower than the mean of each individual's intelligence or morality."
- Christian Lous Lange
(Related: Intelligence, Morality, People, Acting, Psychology, Spiritual)
"The essential function of art is moral. But a passionate, implicit morality, not didactic. A morality which changes the blood, rather than the mind."
- David Herbert Lawrence
(Related: Art, Morality, Blood, Mind)
"The true artist doesn't substitute immorality for morality. On the contrary, he always substitutes a finer morality for a grosser one."
- David Herbert Lawrence
(Related: Morality, Artist)
"There's always the hyena of morality at the garden gate, and the real wolf at the end of the street."
- David Herbert Lawrence
(Related: Morality, End, Garden)
"I think the greater responsibility, in terms of morality, is where leadership begins."
- Norman Lear
(Related: Leadership, Morality, Responsibility)
"The message that President Obama delivered in his speech at Notre Dame was: morality is immoral. Pro-life is the extremist position, not a moral position. Yet we should compromise and work to reduce abortions. Where's the compromise between life and death - and why work to reduce the number of them occurring if there's nothing wrong with them?"
- Rush Limbaugh
(Related: Death, Life, Work, Morality, Compromise, Nothing, President, Speech, Wrong)
"To love our neighbor as ourselves is such a truth for regulating human society, that by that alone one might determine all the cases in social morality."
- John Locke
(Related: Love, Society, Morality, Truth)
"Morality without religion is only a kind of dead reckoning - an endeavor to find our place on a cloudy sea by measuring the distance we have run, but without any observation of the heavenly bodies."
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
(Related: Religion, Morality, Observation, Sea)
"We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality."
- Thomas B. Macaulay
(Related: Morality, Public)
"The number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the state."
- James Madison
(Related: Morality, People, Church, Devotion, Separation, State)
"Obscenity is a moral concept in the verbal arsenal of the establishment, which abuses the term by applying it, not to expressions of its own morality but to those of another."
- Herbert Marcuse
(Related: Morality)
"Surveillance induced morality: relics of cultural retardation."
- Marc Maron
"Chaperons don't enforce morality; they force immorality to be discreet."
- Judith Martin
(Related: Morality, Force)
"Chaperons, even in their days of glory, were almost never able to enforce morality; what they did was to force immorality to be discreet. This is no small contribution."
- Judith Martin
(Related: Morality, Force, Glory)
"Science by itself has no moral dimension. But it does seek to establish truth. And upon this truth morality can be built."
- William Masters
(Related: Science, Morality, Truth)
"There is a tone of morality throughout the rural districts of England, which is unhappily wanting in the large towns and the centres of particular manufactures."
- Henry Mayhew
(Related: Morality, England)
"Fear, conformity, immorality: these are heavy burdens. They drain us of creative energy. And when we are drained of creative energy, we do not create. We procreate, but we do not create."
- David McCallum
(Related: Fear, Conformity, Energy)
"And there was a real shedding of the old dogma, like boundaries of morality were being broken down and everybody was into the new party mode of just loving on each other. Which destroyed thousands of us. I lost 16 of my personal friends through that lifestyle."
- Barry McGuire
(Related: Morality, Being, Friends, Old, Party)
"Morality is the theory that every human act must be either right or wrong, and that 99 % of them are wrong."
- H. L. Mencken
(Related: Morality, Act, Right, Theory, Wrong)
"Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time."
- H. L. Mencken
(Related: Time, Morality)
"Honor is simply the morality of superior men."
- H. L. Mencken
(Related: Men, Morality, Honor)
"We say to the British government: you have kept those sculptures for almost two centuries. You have cared for them as well as you could, for which we thank you. But now in the name of fairness and morality, please give them back."
- Melina Mercouri
(Related: Morality, Name, Now)
"This is someone who has a very stringent morality, and believes the system works, and has been deeply, deeply disappointed, and hurt, by it. You know, so she's in a very different place in life."
- Julianne Moore
(Related: Life, Morality, Hurt)
"I don't think anybody cares about unwed mothers unless they're black or poor. The question is not morality, the question is money. That's what we're upset about."
- Toni Morrison
(Related: Money, Morality, Mothers, Poor, Question)
"I learned a lot about morality from fiction, from movies."
- Rob Morrow
(Related: Movies, Morality, Fiction)
"Morality is the herd-instinct in the individual."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
(Related: Morality)
"Fear is the mother of morality."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
(Related: Mother, Morality, Fear)
"In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
(Related: Religion, Morality, Christianity, Reality)
"To be ashamed of one's immorality: that is a step on the staircase at whose end one is also ashamed of one's morality."
- Friedrich Nietzsche
(Related: Morality, End)
"Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life."
- Phil Ochs
(Related: Life, Art, Religion, Morality, Absurdity, Defeat, World)
"The Japanese chose the principle of eternal peace as the basis of morality for our rebirth after the War."
- Kenzaburo Oe
(Related: Peace, War, Morality, Rebirth)
"Vanity of science. Knowledge of physical science will not console me for ignorance of morality in time of affliction, but knowledge of morality will always console me for ignorance of physical science."
- Blaise Pascal
(Related: Science, Time, Morality, Knowledge, Affliction, Ignorance, Vanity, Will)
"The moral equation strongly tells everyone who understands freedom, who understands morality, that Israel is engaging in a just war in defense of its people and its freedom."
- George Pataki
(Related: War, Morality, People, Defense, Freedom, Israel)
"As for morality, well that's all tied up with the question of consciousness."
- Roger Penrose
(Related: Morality, Consciousness, Question)
"If you didn't have any conscious beings in the world, there really wouldn't be morality but with consciousness that you have it."
- Roger Penrose
(Related: Morality, Consciousness, World)
"But I think it is a serious issue to wonder about the other platonic absolutes of say beauty and morality."
- Roger Penrose
(Related: Beauty, Morality, Wonder)
"Thinking that morality is all about commandments is a relatively new way of thinking, since the Reformation."
- Timothy Radcliffe
(Related: Morality, Thinking)
"How often I have found that we grow to maturity not by doing what we like, but by doing what we should. How true it is that not every 'should' is a compulsion, and not every 'like' is a high morality and true freedom."
- Karl Rahner
(Related: Morality, Freedom, Maturity)
"The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live."
- Ayn Rand
(Related: Morality, Purpose)
"There can be no such thing, in law or in morality, as actions to an individual, but permitted to a mob."
- Ayn Rand
(Related: Morality, Actions, Law, Mob)
"Force and mind are opposites; morality ends where a gun begins."
- Ayn Rand
(Related: Morality, Force, Mind, Opposites)
"If any civilization is to survive, it is the morality of altruism that men have to reject."
- Ayn Rand
(Related: Men, Morality, Civilization, Altruism)
"Morality, as has often been pointed out, is antecedent to religion-it even exists in a rudimentary form among animals."
- Herbert Read
(Related: Religion, Morality, Animals)
"A religion so cheerless, a philosophy so sorrowful, could never have succeeded with the masses of mankind if presented only as a system of metaphysics. Buddhism owed its success to its catholic spirit and its beautiful morality."
- William Winwood Reade
(Related: Religion, Success, Morality, Buddhism, Mankind, Metaphysics, Philosophy, Spirit)
"There is a crisis of public morality. Instead of policing bedrooms, we ought to be doing a better job policing boardrooms."
- Robert Reich
(Related: Morality, Crisis, Job, Public)
"Morality is the weakness of the brain."
- Arthur Rimbaud
(Related: Morality, Weakness)
"I saw that all beings are fated to happiness: action is not life, but a way of wasting some force, an enervation. Morality is the weakness of the brain."
- Arthur Rimbaud
(Related: Life, Morality, Action, Force, Weakness)
"The Ten Commandments are the most visible symbol because these commandments are recognized by Christians and Jews alike as being the foundation of our system of public morality."
- Pat Robertson
(Related: Morality, Being, Public, Symbol)
"Morality, like language, is an invented structure for conserving and communicating order. And morality is learned, like language, by mimicking and remembering."
- Jane Rule
(Related: Morality, Language, Order)
"Morality is a test of our conformity rather than our integrity."
- Jane Rule
(Related: Morality, Conformity, Integrity)
"The acceptance that all that is solid has melted into the air, that reality and morality are not givens but imperfect human constructs, is the point from which fiction begins."
- Salman Rushdie
(Related: Morality, Acceptance, Fiction, Reality)
"Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I'll tell you what you are."
- John Ruskin
(Related: Morality, Taste)
"Morality without a sense of paradox is mean."
- Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
(Related: Morality, Paradox, Sense)
"One has only as much morality as one has philosophy and poetry."
- Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
(Related: Poetry, Morality, Philosophy)
"The difference between religion and morality lies simply in the classical division of things into the divine and the human, if one only interprets this correctly."
- Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
(Related: Religion, Morality, Difference, Lies)
"Where there is politics or economics, there is no morality."
- Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
(Related: Politics, Morality, Economics)
"Compassion is the basis of morality."
- Arthur Schopenhauer
(Related: Morality, Compassion)
"Reverence for life affords me my fundamental principle of morality."
- Albert Schweitzer
(Related: Life, Morality)
"Try to find the path of least resistance and use it without harming others. Live with integrity and morality, not only with people but with all beings."
- Steven Seagal
(Related: Morality, People, Integrity)
"If anyone tells you that you cannot legislate morality, remeber that legislation IS morality."
- Jay Alan Sekulow
(Related: Morality, Legislation)
"Religion and morality are critical to how students think about politics and form opinions on political issues."
- Jeanne Shaheen
(Related: Politics, Religion, Morality, Opinions, Students)
"I have to live for others and not for myself: that's middle-class morality."
- George Bernard Shaw
(Related: Morality)
"Myths are stories that express meaning, morality or motivation. Whether they are true or not is irrelevant."
- Michael Shermer
(Related: Motivation, Morality, Meaning, Myths)
"Rosa Parks was a woman of strength, conviction, and morality. Her action on December 1, 1955, to defy the law made her a leading figure in our nation's civil rights history."
- John Shimkus
(Related: History, Morality, Action, Strength, Civil rights, Conviction, December, Law, Leading, Nation, Woman)
"So always, if we look back, concern for face-to-face morality, and its modern emphasis on justice as well, have historically evolved as religious issues."
- Huston Smith
(Related: Morality, Concern, Justice, Religious)
"A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true."
- Socrates
(Related: Morality, Values, Illusion, Nothing, Sound)
"The vanity of men, a constant insult to women, is also the ground for the implicit feminine claim of superior sensitivity and morality."
- Patricia Meyer Spacks
(Related: Men, Women, Morality, Insult, Sensitivity, Vanity)
"The preservation of health is a duty. Few seem conscious that there is such a thing as physical morality."
- Herbert Spencer
(Related: Health, Morality, Duty)
"Irony, I feel, is a very high form of morality."
- Jean Stafford
(Related: Morality, Irony)
"Once is a man's life, for one mortal moment, he must make a grab for immorality; if not, he has not lived."
- Sylvester Stallone
(Related: Life, Man)
"I tend to think of action movies as exuberant morality plays in which good triumphs over evil."
- Sylvester Stallone
(Related: Movies, Morality, Action, Evil)
"I look upon it as a Point of Morality, to be obliged by those who endeavour to oblige me."
- Richard Steele
(Related: Morality)
"Morality is only moral when it is voluntary."
- Lincoln Steffens
(Related: Morality)
"I believe that a long step toward public morality will have been taken when sins are called by their right names."
- Billy Sunday
(Related: Morality, Names, Public, Right, Will)
"A poem may be an instance of morality, of social conditions, of psychological history; it may instance all its qualities, but never one of them alone, nor any two or three; never less than all."
- Allen Tate
(Related: History, Morality, May)
"Politicians have limited power. They can't impose morality on themselves. How can they impose it on the country?"
- Cal Thomas
(Related: Power, Morality, Country, Politicians)
"People who relieve others of their money with guns are called robbers. It does not alter the immorality of the act when the income transfer is carried out by government."
- Cal Thomas
(Related: Government, Money, People, Act, Income)
"Aim above morality. Be not simply good, be good for something."
- Henry David Thoreau
(Related: Morality)
"Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something."
- Henry David Thoreau
(Related: Life, Morality, May)
"He was as great as a man can be without morality."
- Alexis de Tocqueville
(Related: Morality, Man)
"Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith."
- Alexis de Tocqueville
(Related: Faith, Morality, Liberty)
"If the Great Way perishes there will morality and duty. When cleverness and knowledge arise great lies will flourish. When relatives fall out with one another there will be filial duty and love. When states are in confusion there will be faithful servants."
- Lao Tzu
(Related: Love, Morality, Knowledge, Cleverness, Confusion, Duty, Lies, Relatives, states, Will)
"You can't legislate morality."
- Jesse Ventura
(Related: Morality)
"Religion is no more the parent of morality than an incubator is the mother of a chicken."
- Lemuel K. Washburn
(Related: Religion, Mother, Morality)
"Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."
- George Washington
(Related: Experience, Religion, Morality, Caution, Reason, Religious)
"When a citizen gives his suffrage to a man of known immorality he abuses his trust; he sacrifices not only his own interest, but that of his neighbor; he betrays the interest of his country."
- Noah Webster
(Related: Trust, Country, Interest, Man)
"Rigour is to the mathematician what morality is to men."
- Andre Weil
(Related: Men, Morality)
"To set up as a standard of public morality a notion which can neither be defined nor conceived is to open the door to every kind of tyranny."
- Simone Weil
(Related: Morality, Open, Public, Tyranny)
"Morality will perform all this; and Morality is the fruit of Illumination."
- Adam Weishaupt
(Related: Morality, Will)
"The law is constantly based on notions of morality, and if all laws representing essentially moral choices are to be invalidated under the due process clause, the courts will be very busy indeed."
- Byron White
(Related: Morality, Choices, Law, Laws, Will)
"Mere heathen morality, and not Jesus Christ, is preached in most of our churches."
- George Whitefield
(Related: Morality, Christ, Churches)
"What is morality in any given time or place? It is what the majority then and there happen to like and immorality is what they dislike."
- Alfred North Whitehead
(Related: Time, Morality, Majority)
"Morality is simply the attitude we adopt towards people whom we personally dislike."
- Oscar Wilde
(Related: Morality, People, Attitude)
"Even in this glowering age, morality animates our lives with meaning."
- Armstrong Williams
(Related: Age, Morality, Meaning)
"I do not think athletes should get a free pass. I don't think we should train our children and future athletes to believe that they are above the law and morality."
- Armstrong Williams
(Related: Morality, Athletes, Children, Future, Law)
"Therefore the great mediator of any community is human morality."
- Armstrong Williams
(Related: Morality, Community)
"It's a morality film, and it poses the question "What would you do?" I took it very seriously, just as the director did in terms of atmosphere and lighting, and I was just trying to help that vision along."
- Kevin Williamson
(Related: Morality, Vision, Film, Help, Question, Trying)
"Watergate provides a model case study of the interaction and powers of each of the branches of government. It also is a morality play with a sad and dramatic ending."
- Bob Woodward
(Related: Government, Morality, Ending, Play, Study)
"So, one of the things I was doing with the aliens in The Quiet Invasion was creating that advanced society which had ideas about morality and proper use of natural resources that were radically different from ours, as the Europeans were from the American Indians."
- Sarah Zettel
(Related: Society, Morality, Ideas, American, Quiet)
"A person is born with desires of the eyes and ears, and a liking for beautiful sights and sounds. If he gives way to them, they will lead him to immorality and lack of restriction, and any ritual principles and propriety will be abandoned."
- Xun Zi
(Related: Eyes, Principles, Ritual, Will)
"What happens when good people are put into an evil place? Do they triumph or does the situation dominate their past history and morality?"
- Philip Zimbardo
(Related: History, Morality, People, Evil, Past)