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Motive Quotes

Browse 1214 quotes about Motive.

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Motive Quotes

“I can write no other than this: unless we use the weapons of the spirit, denying ourselves and taking up our cross and following Jesus, dying with Him and rising with Him, men will go on fighting, and often from the highest motives, believing that they are fighting defensive wars for justice and in self-defense against present or future aggression.”

MenWritingBelieveI CanWarSelfUseSpiritFightingJesusJusticeDyingGoes OnWeaponsHighestCrossesFollowingDefenseMotiveRisingAggressionSelf DefenseFollowing Jesus
Book:On Pilgrimage
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“Since the primary motive of the evil is disguise, one of the places evil people are most likely to be found is within the church. What better way to conceal one's evil from oneself, as well as from others, than to be a deacon or some other highly visible form of Christian within our culture? ... I do not mean to imply that the evil are anything other than a small minority among the religious or that the religious motives of most people are in any way spurious. I mean only that evil people tend to gravitate toward piety for the disguise and concealment it can offer them.”

PeopleWayWellsMeanChristianFormCultureEvilFoundChurchReligiousAtheismOffersOneselfPositive AtheismPrimariesMotiveVisibleMinoritiesDisguisePietyBetter WaysEvil PeopleConcealmentDeacons
Author:Martin Buber
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“I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world; it is-THE CHARITY OF ITS SILENCE. Let no man write my epitaph; for as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me rest in obscurity and peace, and my name remain uninscribed, until other times and other men can do justice to my character. When my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written.”

KnowsMenWorldWritingCountryCharacterEarthAsksNamesNationsCan DoJusticeSilenceWrittenThis WorldIgnorancePrejudiceCharityDareMotiveRequestObscurityDepartureEpitaph
Book:Irish eloquence: The speeches of the celebrated Irish orators, Philips, Curran and Grattan
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“To most people in the UK, indeed throughout Western Europe, space exploration is primarily perceived as 'what NASA does'. This perception is - in many respects - a valid one. Superpower rivalry during the Cold War ramped up US and Soviet space efforts to a scale that Western Europe had no motive to match.”

PeopleDoeWarSpaceEffortColdPerceptionEuropeWesternScalesMotiveExplorationSovietCold WarSpace ExplorationSuperpowerRivalryNasaWestern Europe
Author:Martin Rees
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“I abhor unjust war. I abhor injustice and bullying by the strong at the expense of the weak, whether among nations or individuals. I abhor violence and bloodshed. I believe that war should never be resorted to when, or so long as, it is honorably possible to avoid it. I respect all men and women who from high motives and with sanity and self-respect do all they can to avert war. I advocate preparation for war in order to avert war; and I should never advocate war unless it were the only alternative to dishonor.”

MenShouldBelieveLongWarSelfOrderIndividualStrongI BelieveNationsViolenceMen And WomenWeakInjusticeAlternativesPreparationMotiveSelf RespectExpensesBullyingSanityUnjustBloodshedDishonorAvertUnjust War
Book:The Rough Riders: An Autobiography
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“God never estimates what we give from impulse. We are given credit for what we determine in our hearts to give; for the giving that is governed by a fixed determination. The Spirit of God revolutionises our philanthropic instincts. Much of our philanthropy is simply the impulse to save ourselves an uncomfortable feeling. The Spirit of God alters all that. As saints our attitude towards giving is that we give for Jesus Christ's sake, and from no other motive.”

GivingHeartFeelingsSpiritJesusGivenChristAttitudeJesus ChristDeterminationInstinctSakeSaintDetermineCreditImpulseFixedUncomfortableMotivePhilanthropySpirit Of GodPhilanthropicUncomfortable Feeling
Book:The Quotable Oswald Chambers
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“Love is the spirit that motivates the artist's journey. The love may sublime, raw, obsessive, passionate, awful. or thrilling, but whatever its quality, it's a powerful motive in the artist's life.”

MaySpiritArtistLove IsPowerfulQualityJourneyPassionateAwfulMotiveSublimeThrillingObsessive
Book:Creativity for Life: Practical Advice on the Artist's Personality, and Career from America's Foremost Creativity Coach
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“The parallel between antifeminism and race prejudice is striking. The same underlying motives appear to be at work, namely fear, jealousy, feelings of insecurity, fear of economic competition, guilt feelings, and the like. Many of the leaders of the feminist movement in the nineteenth-century United States clearly understood the similarity of the motives at work in antifeminism and race discrimination and associated themselves with the anti slavery movement.”

StatesFeelingsUnitedRaceLeaderUnited StatesEconomicCenturyMovementRacismUnderstoodPrejudiceSlaveryGuiltCompetitionFeministDiscriminationMotiveInsecuritySexismParallelsSimilarityNineteenth CenturyFeminist MovementAnti SlaveryGuilt FeelingsEconomic Competition
Author:Ashley Montagu
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“Christian morality (so called) has all the characters of a reaction.... In its horror of sensuality, it made an idol of asceticism, which has been gradually compromised away into one of legality. It holds out the hope of heaven and the threat of hell, as the appointed and appropriate motives to a virtuous life - in this falling far below the best of the ancients, and doing what lies in it to give to human morality an essentially selfish character.... It is essentially a doctrine of passive obedience; it inculcates submission to all authorities found established.”

GivingHumansHas BeensMadeCharacterChristianLyingFallFoundHeavenHellAtheismMoralityHorrorAuthorityThreatPositive AtheismSelfishReactionsDoctrineSensualityObedienceMotiveAppropriateIdolsVirtuousPassiveSubmissionAsceticismLegalityChristian MoralityVirtuous Life
Book:Utilitarianism, liberty, and representative government
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“Belief, thus, in the supernatural, great as are the services which it rendered in the early stages of human development, cannot be considered to be any longer required, either for enabling us to know what is right and wrong in social morality, or for supplying us with motives to do right and to abstain from wrong.”

KnowsHumansBeliefSocialAtheismStageDevelopmentMoralityPositive AtheismMotiveHuman DevelopmentEnabling
Book:Nature, the Utility of Religion, and Theism. Being three Essays on Religion. With introductory notice by Helen Taylor
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“It is pathetic to observe how lowly the motives are that religion, even the highest, attributes to the deity... To be given the best morsel, to be remembered, to be praised, to be obeyed blindly and punctiliously - these have been thought points of honor with the gods.”

Has BeensGivenAtheismHonorHighestPositive AtheismRememberedMotiveAttributesDeitiesPathetic
Book:Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana
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“Now that Stevenson is dead I can think of but one English- speaking author who is really keeping his self-respect and sticking forperfection. Of course I refer to that mighty master of language and keen student of human actions and motives, Henry James.”

ThinkingHumansI CanSelfActionCoursesLanguageStudentsMastersMotiveSelf RespectHuman ActionsEnglish Speaking
Book:A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays
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“In using the strong hand, as now compelled to do, the government has a difficult duty to perform. At the very best, it will by turns do both too little and too much. It can properly have no motive of revenge, no purpose to punish merely for punishment's sake. While we must, by all available means, prevent the overthrow of the government, we should avoid planting and cultivating too many thorns in the bosom of society.”

ShouldMeanLittlesHandsGovernmentPurposeTurnsStrongDifficultToo MuchDutySakeAvailableRevengePunishmentMotiveCompelledBosomsThornsCultivatingStrong Hands
Book:Abraham Lincoln; Complete Works, Comprising His Speeches, Letters, State Papers, and Miscellaneous Writings
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“The good diarist writes either for himself alone or for a posterity so distant that it can safely hear every secret and justly weigh every motive. For such an audience there is need neither of affectation nor of restraint. Sincerity is what they ask, detail, and volume; skill with the pen comes in conveniently, but brilliance is not necessary; genius is a hindrance even; and should you know your business and do it manfully, posterity will let you off mixing with great men, reporting famous affairs, or having lain with the first ladies in the land.”

KnowsMenNeedsShouldWritingFirstsAsksSecretAudienceLandGeniusSkillsAffairDetailsMotiveGreat MenPensSincerityVolumeRestraintDiariesPosterityBrillianceMixingHindranceFirst Lady
Book:Collected essays
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“When one has once accepted and absorbed Evil, it no longer demands the unfitness of the means. The ulterior motives with which youabsorb and assimilate Evil are not your own but those of Evil.... Evil is whatever distracts. Evil knows of the Good, but Good does not know of Evil. Knowledge of oneself is something only Evil has. One means that Evil has is the dialogue.... One cannot pay Evil in installments--and one always keeps on trying to.”

KnowsTryingMeanDoeEvilPayDemandGoodnessOneselfAcceptedDialogueMotiveSeductionUlterior Motive
Author:Franz Kafka
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“... so long as woman labors to second man's endeavors and exalt his sex above her own, her virtues pass unquestioned; but when shedares to demand rights and privileges for herself, her motives, manners, dress, personal appearance, and character are subjects for ridicule and detraction.”

MenLongCharacterSexVirtueRightsSubjectsDemandLaborDressesPrivilegeAppearanceMannersMotiveEndeavorRidiculeRights And PrivilegesPersonal Appearance
Book:Eighty Years and More: Reminiscences, 1815-1897
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“The private motives of scientists are not the trend of science. The trend of science is made by the needs of society: navigation before the eighteenth century, manufacture thereafter; and in our age I believe the liberation of personality. Whatever the part which scientists like to act, or for that matter which painters like to dress, science shares the aims of our society just as art does.”

NeedsBelieveDoeArtMadeMatterAgeI BelieveSocietyShareCenturyPersonalityScientistAimDressesPainterLiberationMotiveOur SocietyTrendsNavigation
Book:The Common Sense of Science
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“The proper office of religion is to regulate the heart of men, humanize their conduct, infuse the spirit of temperance, order, andobedience; and as its operation is silent, and only enforces the motives of morality and justice, it is in danger of being overlooked, and confounded with these other motives.”

MenHeartSpiritReligionOrderJusticeDangerMoralityOfficeSilentOperationsMotiveTemperanceOverlooked
Book:Dialogues and Natural History of Religion
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“Reason, in a strict sense, as meaning the judgment of truth and falsehood, can never, of itself, be any motive to the will, and can have no influence but so far as it touches some passion or affection. Abstract relations of ideas are the object of curiosity, not of volition. And matters of fact, where they are neither good nor evil, where they neither excite desire nor aversion, are totally indifferent, and whether known or unknown, whether mistaken or rightly apprehended, cannot be regarded as any motive to action.”

IdeasMatterReasonFactsTruthActionDesirePassionEvilKnownInfluenceObjectsJudgmentRelationCuriosityAffectionJudgementMotiveAbstractFalsehoodIndifferentStrictMistakenMatter Of FactAversionVolitionTruth And Falsehood
Book:A Dissertation on the Passions: The Natural History of Religion : a Critical Edition
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