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Morality Quotes

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Morality Quotes

“The Nazi danger to our Western world has long ceased to be a mere possibility. The danger is here now--not only from a military enemy but from an enemy of all law, all liberty, all morality, all religion.”

WorldLongLawLibertyEnemyMilitaryDangerPossibilityMoralityMereWesternNaziWestern World
Book:Fireside chats of Franklin Delano Roosevelt: radio addresses to the American people about the Depression, the New Deal, and the Second World War, 1933-1944
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“There can be no truly moral choice unless that choice is made in freedom; similarly, there can be no really firmly grounded and consistent defense of freedom unless that defense is rooted in moral principle. In concentrating on the ends of choice, the conservative, by neglecting the conditions of choice, loses that very morality of conduct with which he is so concerned. And the libertarian, by concentrating only on the means, or conditions, of choice and ignoring the ends, throws away an essential moral defense of his own position.”

MeanMadeEndsChoicesLosesFreedomResponsibilityLibertyMoralPrinciplesVirtueConditionsPositionIgnoranceMoralityEssentialsConcernedConservativeDefenseLibertarianConsistentNeglectRootedGroundedConcentratingMoral PrinciplesMoral Choices
Author:Murray Rothbard
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“Every age and every nation has certain characteristic vices, which prevail almost universally, which scarcely any person scruples to avow, and which even rigid moralists but faintly censure. Succeeding generations change the fashion of their morals with the fashion of their hats and their coaches; take some other kind of wickedness under their patronage, and wonder at the depravity of their ancestors.”

KindPersonsAgeCertainNationsWonderMoralGenerationsFashionMoralitySucceedVicesCoachesCharacteristicsHatsAncestorWickednessDepravityCensureMoralistScruplesPatronage
Author:Thomas B. Macaulay
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“Anne of Austria (with great submission to a Crowned Head do I say it) was a B----. She had spirit and courage without parts, devotion without common morality, and lewdness without tenderness either to justify or to dignify it. Her two sons were no more Lewis the Thirteen's than they were mine.”

TwoCharacterSpiritCommonMinesSonMoralityDevotionJustifyTendernessSubmissionRoyaltyAdulteryThirteenAustria
Book:Letters Written by the Earl of Chesterfield to His Son
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“That is the real pivot of all bourgeois consciousness in all countries: fear and hate of the instinctive, intuitional, procreativebody in man or woman. But of course this fear and hate had to take on a righteous appearance, so it became moral, said that the instincts, intuitions and all the activities of the procreative body were evil, and promised a reward for their suppression. That is the great clue to bourgeois psychology: the reward business.”

MenSaidRealCountryBodyHateCoursesEvilSexConsciousnessMoralPsychologyMoralityActivityInstinctRewardsAppearanceIntuitionRighteousClueBourgeoisSuppressionInstinct Intuition
Book:Delphi Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence (Illustrated)
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“Does history warrant the conclusion that religion is necessary to morality - that a natural ethic is too weak to withstand the savagery that lurks under civilization and emerges in our dreams, crimes and wars? ... There is no significant example in history, before our time, of a society successfully maintaining moral life without the aid of religion.”

DoeWarDreamReligionNaturalMoralCrimeExampleMoralityCivilizationEthicsWeakAidsSignificantConclusionOur TimeOur DreamsMaintainingWarrantsSavageryMoral Life
Book:The Lessons of History
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“If the world is an aggregate of relatively independent regions, then any assumption of universal laws is false and a demand for universal norms tyrannical: only brute force (or seductive deception) can then bend the different moralities so that they fit the prescriptions of a single ethical system. And indeed, the idea of universal laws of nature and society arose in connection with a life-and-death battle: the battle that gave Zeus the power over the Titans and all other gods and thus turned his laws into the laws of the universe.”

IfsWorldIdeasDifferentLawUniverseForceFitMoralityBattleDemandConnectionsUniversalIndependentDeceptionAssumptionLife And DeathRegionsEthicalNormLaws Of NatureBrutesPrescriptionsSeductiveZeusBrute ForceUniversal LawsTitans
Author:Paul Feyerabend
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“Tracing the progress of mankind in the ascending path of civilization, and moral and intellectual culture, our fathers found that the divine ordinance of government, in every stage of the ascent, was adjustable on principles of common reason to the actual condition of a people, and always had for its objects, in the benevolent councils of the divine wisdom, the happiness, the expansion, the security, the elevation of society, and the redemption of man. They sought in vain for any title of authority of man over man, except of superior capacity and higher morality.”

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Author:William M. Evarts
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“A choice is the root of all morality. Without choice, one can have no moral code. In a vacuum bereft of alternatives, there can be no values. And without values, there can be no reason for a code of ethics. What gives our lives meaning is which alternatives we choose. If we have no options, if we can take but one path, we are by definition slaves.”

IfsGivingReasonValuesChoicesMoralPathOur LivesMoralityEthicsRootsSlaveDefinitionsAlternativesCodeMeaning Of LifeNo ReasonVacuumsLife MeansMoral CodeBereftCode Of Ethics
Author:Dave Galanter
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“Is it not manifest that our academic institutions should have a wider scope; that they should not be timid and keep the ruts of the last generation, but that wise men thinking for themselves and heartily seeking the good of mankind, and counting the cost of innovation, should dare to arouse the young to a just and heroic life; that the moral nature should be addressed in the school-room, and children should be treated as the high-born candidates of truth and virtue?”

ThinkingMenShouldChildrenSchoolLastsYoungBornRoomsEducationMoralVirtueWiseGenerationsMankindMoralityCostShould HaveInnovationInstitutionsSeekingDareTreatedCandidatesManifestHeroicAcademicScopeCountingRutsCounting The Cost
Book:The Selected Lectures of Ralph Waldo Emerson
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“... the structure of our public morality crashed to earth. Above its grave a tombstone read, "Be tolerant--even of evil." Logically the next step would be to say to our commonwealth's criminals, "I disagree that it's all right to rob and murder, but naturally I respect your opinion." Tolerance is only complacence when it makes no distinction between right and wrong.”

Would BeEarthEvilNextStepsOpinionMoralityMurderStructureCriminalsToleranceGravesDistinctionDisagreeNext StepsCommonwealthTombstone
Book:The Desegregated Heart: A Virginian's Stand in Time of Transition
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“It is easy enough to say, Be true to your values. But what if your values are irrational? Or what if the virtues you have committed yourself to are so much against human nature that they cannot be practiced consistently? Be careful of what you accept as your code of morality. Think carefully about whether its tenets serve your life and well being. Exercise critical judgment. Realize how much is at stake-your life, your happiness, your self-esteem.”

IfsThinkingHumansWellsSelfEnoughValuesEasyRealizingAcceptingVirtueHuman NatureSelf EsteemMoralityExerciseJudgmentCommittedCarefulCriticalEsteemBeing TrueWell BeingCodeWhat IfStakesBe CarefulConsistentlyIrrational
Author:Nathaniel Branden
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“Zarathustra was the first to consider the fight of good and evil the very wheel in the machinery of things: the transposition of morality into the metaphysical realm, as a force, cause, and end in itself, is his work. [...] Zarathustra created this most calamitous error, morality; consequently, he must also be the first to recognize it.”

FirstsEndsFightingEvilForceCausesMoralityErrorsRealmsWheelsGood And EvilMetaphysicalMachineryZarathustra
Book:Philosophical Writings: Friedrich Nietzsche
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