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Morality Quotes

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Morality Quotes

“THERE is no method of reasoning more common, and yet none more blameable, than, in philosophical disputes, to endeavour the refutation of any hypothesis, by a pretence of its dangerous consequences to religion and morality. When any opinion leads to absurdities, it is certainly false; but it is not certain that an opinion is false, because it is of dangerous consequence. Such topics, therefore, ought entirely to be forborne; as serving nothing to the discovery of truth, but only to make the person of an antagonist odious.”

PersonsCertainCommonOpinionDangerousOughtMoralityDiscoveryConsequencePhilosophicalMethodReasoningServingAbsurdityTopicsHypothesisDisputesEndeavourPretenceAntagonistRefutation
Book:Essays Moral, Political, and Literary
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“This is the very heart of true morality--not to struggle, not to fight with any weapons, for one's self alone--but to struggle and to fight for the common interest, to wield the power of brain and good right arm if need be for one's family, for the ordered community of life, for the state, for moral principles, humanity, and the common good.”

IfsNeedsHeartSelfStatesHumanityFightingInterestCommunityCommonBrainMoralPrinciplesStruggleArmsMoralityWeaponsCommon GoodMoral PrinciplesCommon Interests
Author:Joseph Alexander Leighton
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“To discover the true principles of morality, men have no need of theology, of revelation, or of gods. They need but common sense. They have only to look within themselves, to reflect upon their own nature, to consult their obvious interests, to consider the object of society and of each of the members who compose it, and they will easily understand that virtue is an advantage, and that vice is an injury to beings of the species.”

MenNeedsLooksInterestCommonPrinciplesVirtueAtheismObjectsMoralityMembersAdvantageSpeciesVicesObviousTheologyCommon SenseRevelationsInjury
Author:Jean Meslier
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“Even if it is true that all cultures share a common morality, why does this prove a supreme intelligence? After all, don't we humanists sometimes claim that there is a common thread of humanistic values running through history across cultural and religious lines?”

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Book:Losing Faith in Faith: From Preacher to Atheist
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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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“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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“To neglect the common ground with other primates, and to deny the evolutionary roots of human morality, would be like arriving at the top of a tower to declare that the rest of the building is irrelevant, that the precious concept of "tower" ought to be reserved for the summit.”

HumansWould BeCommonBuildingOughtMoralityConceptsRootsDenyNeglectTowersIrrelevantSummitReservedArrivingCommon GroundPrimates
Book:Primates and Philosophers: How Morality Evolved
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“Police have both extra constraints and extra permissions - on the one hand, they can't dodge involvement in social disorder as the rest of us can and they may be required to conduct themselves privately in a way that does not undermine their public authority; on the other hand, they have permission to engage in deceptions, invasions of privacy and uses of force that are forbidden to the rest of us. But this does not put them beyond common morality.”

CommonMoralityAuthorityPoliceDeceptionExtrasPrivacyForbiddenInvolvement
Author:John Kleinig
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“What we have to ask is this: what can we morally expect of and allow to people whom we deploy to fulfill this or that social role :police officer, school teacher, physician? This may sometimes lead to difficult social decisions - e.g. should police be permitted to illegally import drugs as part of a sting operation? In the end, I think "common - that is, critical - morality" should determine the limits of the police role.”

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Author:John Kleinig
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“The gay rights movement of recent years has been an inspiring victory for humanity and it is in the tradition of the civil rights movement when I was a young boy in the South, the women's suffrage movement when my mother was a young woman in Tennessee, the abolition movement much farther back, and the anti-apartheid movement when I was in the House of Representatives. All of these movements have one thing in common: the opposition to progress was rooted in an outdated understanding of morality.”

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Author:Al Gore
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“If I drive my car to the store, those carbon molecules that are emitted actually get into the atmosphere circulation systems and affect climate in a global basis. This is shocking, this is amazing! No one in the 18th Century would have believed that anything like this were at all possible and I don't think we have, as part of our common sense, morality, norms and values that are really responsive to those kinds of issues, to the kind of power that we now are able to exert over the future and over people who live very far from us.”

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Author:Dale Jamieson
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“It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.”

WorldInspirationalShouldCharacterCommonMoralCourageInspirational LifeMoralityIntegrityEthicsBraveryBraveCuriousThings To DoEthicalBe BraveHave CourageBe CourageousMoral ValuesMoral CourageMoral PrinciplesFear And CourageFear CourageMoral ObligationBravery And CourageHonesty IntegrityMoral CharacterHonesty And IntegrityIntegrity And CharacterHonest And IntegrityIntegrity CharacterInspirational CourageRare ThingsHonor And IntegrityBravery And FearMoral DutyMoral EthicsLeadership CourageLove And CourageCourage And LeadershipEthics And IntegrityMorality And EthicsEthics And MoralsPhysical CourageMoral IntegrityMorals And IntegrityMoral LeadershipMoral Behavior
Book:Autobiography of Mark Twain
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“As naturally as the ruled always took the morality imposed upon them more seriously than did the rulers themselves, the deceived masses are today captivated by the myth of success even more than the successful are. Immovably, they insist on the very ideology which enslaves them. The misplaced love of the common people for the wrong which is done to them is a greater force than the cunning of the authorities.”

PeopleDoneTodayForceCommonSuccessfulGreaterMoralityAuthorityMassMythIdeologyRulersCunningDeceivedMisplacedCaptivated
Author:Theodor Adorno
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“It is impossible for us, who live in the latter ages of the world, to make observations in criticism, morality, or in any art or science, which have not been touched upon by others. We have little else left us but to represent the common sense of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more uncommon lights.”

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Book:The spectator
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“All the capital employed in paper speculation is barren and useless, producing, like that on a gaming table, no accession to itself, and is withdrawn from commerce and agriculture where it would have produced addition to the common mass It nourishes in our citizens habits of vice and idleness instead of industry and morality It has furnished effectual means of corrupting such a portion of the legislature as turns the balance between the honest voters whichever way it is directed.”

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Book:The writings of Thomas Jefferson
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“My father always taught by telling stories about his experiences. His lessons were about morality and art and what insects and birds and human beings had in common. He told me what it meant to be a man and to be a Black man. He taught me about love and responsibility, about beauty, and how to make gumbo.”

MenHumansArtStoriesFatherBlackHuman BeingsCommonResponsibilityTaughtMoralityLessonsBirdMeant To BeInsectsBe A ManTelling StoriesLove And ResponsibilityGumbo
Book:What Next: A Memoir Toward World Peace
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“The State, on the other hand, both in its genesis and by its primary intention, is purely anti-social. It is not based on the idea of natural rights, but on the idea that the individual has no rights except those that the State may provisionally grant him. It has always made justice costly and difficult of access, and has invariably held itself above justice and common morality whenever it could advantage itself by so doing.”

MayMadeIdeasStatesIndividualSocialDifficultNaturalJusticeCommonRightsMoralityAdvantageIntentionAccessPrimariesGrantsGenesisNatural RightsAnti Social
Author:Albert J. Nock
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