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Virtue Quotes

Browse 5982 quotes about Virtue.

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Virtue Quotes

“We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government; that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by means of the Bible; for this divine book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and all those sober and frugal virtues which constitute the soul of republicanism.”

MeanBookSoulGovernmentFormLawChristianityPrinciplesVirtueMankindYouthDivineRepublicanUniversalFavorsNeglectSoberForms Of GovernmentFrugalChristianity From Founding FathersPerpetuatingRepublicanismUniversal Education
Book:Essays: Literary, Moral and Philosophical
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“There can be no richer man or woman than the individual who has found his or her labor of love. Personal fulfillment through the virtue of work is the highest form of desire. Work is the conduit between the supply and the demand of all human needs, the forerunner of human progress, and the medium by which the imagination is given the wings of action. A labor of love is exalted because it provides joy and self-expression to those who perform it.”

MenNeedsHumansSelfActionFormJoyDesireFoundIndividualGivenImaginationLove IsActingVirtueProgressExpressionDemandHighestLaborWingsMediumsFulfillmentSelf ExpressionExaltedHuman NeedsHuman ProgressForerunnersPersonal FulfillmentLabor Of LoveFulfillment In Life
Book:What Makes the Great Great: Strategies for Extraordinary Achievement
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“The criminal law has, from the point of view of thwarted virtue, the merit of allowing an outlet for those impulses of aggression which cowardice, disguised as morality, restrains in their more spontaneous forms. War has the same merit. You must not kill you neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism.”

LittlesWarFormLawHateNationsViewsVirtueMoralityPoint Of ViewNeighborCriminalsImpulsePropagandaMeritPatrioticAllowingCowardiceHeroismAggressionSpontaneousOutletsCriminal Law
Author:Bertrand Russell
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“The Spirit of Justice is the single most important seed Piers planted; if you don't live by its teaching, your chance of salvation is nil. Unless Conscience and the Cardinal Virtues form the food that people live on, just take my word for it, they're utterly lost - every single living soul among them!”

PeopleIfsImportantSoulWisdomFormSpiritPoliticsLostJusticeChanceEconomyVirtueTeachingConscienceSalvationSeedsLiberalismLive ByCardinalsPiers
Author:William Langland
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“When death strikes down the innocent and young, for every fragile form from which he lets the panting spirit free, a hundred virtues rise, in shapes of mercy, charity, and love, to walk the world and bless it. Of every tear that sorrowing mortals shed on such green graves, some good is born, some gentler nature comes.”

WorldFormYoungDeathSpiritBornWalksVirtueTearsShapesHundredMercyAnd LoveGreenCharityStrikesGravesInnocentMortalsBlessFragileShedCharity And Love
Book:The Old Curiosity Shop: And Reprinted Pieces
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“The most perfect education ... is such an exercise of the understanding as is best calculated to strengthen the body and form the heart. Or, in other words, to enable the individual to attain such habits of virtue as will render it independent.”

HeartBodyFormIndividualUnderstandingPerfectEducationVirtueHabitExerciseIndependent
Book:Wollstonecraft: A Vindication of the Rights of Men and a Vindication of the Rights of Woman and Hints
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“Virtue, without the graces, is like a rich diamond unpolished--it hardly looks better than a common pebble; but when the hand of the master rubs off the roughness, and forms the sides into a thousand brilliant surfaces, it is then that we acknowledge its worth, admire its beauty, and long to wear it in our bosoms.”

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Book:Aphorisms of Sir Philip Sidney: With Remarks
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“The manly pride of the Romans, content with substantial power, had left to the vanity of the East the forms and ceremonies of ostentatious greatness. But when they lost even the semblance of those virtues which were derived from their ancient freedom, the simplicity of Roman manners was insensibly corrupted by the stately affectation of the courts of Asia.”

FormLostLeftHistoryVirtueGreatnessPrideCourtSimplicityAncientEastVanityMannersAsiaCeremonyManlyRoman EmpireSemblanceOstentatious
Book:History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
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“Error is multiform (for evil is a form of the unlimited, as in the old Pythagorean imagery, and good of the limited), whereas success is possible in one way only (which is why it is easy to fail and difficult to succeed - easy to miss the target and difficult to hit it); so this is another reason why excess and deficiency are a mark of vice, and observance of the mean a mark of virtue: Goodness is simple, badness is manifold.”

WayMeanReasonFormEvilEasyDifficultSimpleVirtueFailingMissingSucceedGoodnessMarkErrorsVicesOne WayReason WhyTargetExcessUnlimitedImageryDeficiencyBadnessObservanceManifold
Book:The Nicomachean ethics
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“Just as a royal rule, if not a mere name, must exist by virtue of some great personal superiority in the king, so tyranny, which is the worst of governments, is necessarily the farthest removed from a well-constituted form; oligarchy is little better, for it is a long way from aristocracy, and democracy is the most tolerable of the three.”

IfsWayWellsLittlesLongGovernmentFormThreeNamesVirtueDemocracyWorstKingsMereTyrannySuperiorityRoyalLong WayAristocracyTolerableOligarchyGreat Person
Book:The Essential Aristotle
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“Neither should we forget the mean, which at the present day is lost sight of in perverted forms of government; for many practices which appear to be democratical are the ruin of democracies, . . Those who think that all virtue is to be found in their own party principles push matters to extremes; they do not consider that disproportion destroys a state.”

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Book:Politics
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“Whereas happiness is the highest good, being a realization and perfect practice of virtue, which some can attain, while others have little or none of it, the various qualities of men are clearly the reason why there are various kinds of states and many forms of government; for different men seek after happiness in different ways and by different means, and so make for themselves different modes of life and forms of government.”

MenWayKindMeanLittlesDifferentStatesReasonGovernmentFormPerfectQualityPracticeVirtueHuman NatureHighestVariousRealizationReason WhyDifferent WaysForms Of GovernmentPerfect Practice
Book:The Essential Aristotle
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“Now what is just and right is to be interpreted in the sense of 'what is equal'; and that which is right in the sense of being equal is to be considered with reference to the advantage of the state, and the common good of the citizens. And a citizen is one who shares in governing and being governed. He differs under different forms of government, but in the best state he is one who is able and willing to be governed and to govern with a view to the life of virtue.”

DifferentStatesGovernmentAbleFormLawJusticeViewsCommonVirtueShareWillingCitizensEqualAdvantageGoverningForms Of GovernmentCommon GoodBeing Equal
Book:Politics
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“If then, as we say, good craftsmen look to the mean as they work, and if virtue, like nature, is more accurate and better than any form of art, it will follow that virtue has the quality of hitting the mean. I refer to moral virtue [not intellectual], for this is concerned with emotions and actions, in which one can have excess or deficiency or a due mean.”

IfsLooksMeanArtActionFormEmotionQualityMoralVirtueIntellectualConcernedDuesExcessAccurateHittingDeficiencyCraftsmanMoral VirtuesIf Then
Book:The Nicomachean ethics
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“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”

FormVirtueMoralityGoodnessJudgmentVicesExtremesSelfishGentlemanPrivacyRetiringModestConstructsDiscouragedAcquaintanceEarly Life
Book:Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life. By George Eliot ....
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“Among the innumerable mortifications which waylay human arrogance on every side may well be reckoned our ignorance of the most common objects and effects, a defect of which we become more sensible by every attempt to supply it. Vulgar and inactive minds confound familiarity with knowledge and conceive themselves informed of the whole nature of things when they are shown their form or told their use; but the speculatist, who is not content with superficial views, harasses himself with fruitless curiosity, and still, as he inquires more, perceives only that he knows less.”

KnowsMindHumansWellsMayStillsReasonWholeUseTruthFormPeaceSidesViewsCommonEducationKnowledgeVirtueEffectsObjectsIgnoranceCuriosityPerceiveArroganceSensibleSuperficialDefectsVulgarFamiliarityMortification
Author:Samuel Johnson
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“There are ancient and modern poems which breathe, in their entirety and in every detail, the divine breath of irony. In such poemsthere lives a real transcendental buffoonery. Their interior is permeated by the mood which surveys everything and rises infinitely above everything limited, even above the poet's own art, virtue, and genius; and their exterior form by the histrionic style of an ordinary good Italian buffo.”

ArtRealFormVirtueModernStyleDivinePoetGeniusOrdinaryBreathsAncientDetailsBreatheMoodIronyItalianInteriorsSurveysExteriorTranscendentalEntiretyHistrionic
Author:Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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“The domestic relations precede, and in our present existence are worth more than all our other social ties. They give the first throb to the heart, and unseal the deep fountains of its love. Home is the chief school of human virtue. Its responsibilities, joys, sorrows, smiles, tears, hopes, and solicitudes form the chief interest of human life.”

GivingFirstsHumansHeartHomeSchoolFormJoySocialInterestExistenceResponsibilityVirtueTearsSorrowRelationChiefsHuman LifeTiesFountainSolicitude
Book:Essays, Literary & Political
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“When we pray for any virtue, we should cultivate the virtue as well as pray for it; the form of your prayer should be the rule of your life; every petition to God is a precept to man. Look not, therefore, upon your prayers as a method of good and salvation only, but as a perpetual monition of duty. By what we require of God we see what he requires of us.”

MenShouldWellsLooksFormPrayerVirtueDutyPrayingMethodSalvationPerpetualOur PrayersPetitions
Author:Jeremy Taylor
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“The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People, in a great Measure, than they have it now. They may change their Rulers, and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty.”

PeopleIfsMayGovernmentFormLibertyVirtuePureConstitutionFoundationInspiredLastingRulersFoundingForms Of GovernmentOur Founding FathersAmerican RevolutionUs Founding FathersBe InspiredAmerican GovernmentFree GovernmentFounding AmericaAmerican Founding FathersMorality And ReligionMoral Virtues
Author:John Adams
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“Upon this point all speculative politicians will agree, that the happiness of society is the end of government, as all divines and moral philosophers will agree that the happiness of the individual is the end of man. From this principle it will follow that the form of government which communicates ease, comfort, security, or, in one word, happiness, to the greatest numbers of persons, and in the greatest degree, is the best. All sober inquirers after truth, ancient and modern, pagan and Christian, have declared that the happiness of man, as well as his dignity, consists in virtue.”

MenWellsPersonsEndsGovernmentChristianFormIndividualNumbersMoralPrinciplesVirtueModernSecurityDivinePoliticianComfortDegreesDignityAgreeAncientPhilosopherCommunicateEaseSoberOne WordPaganForms Of GovernmentInquirers
Book:The Works of John Adams: Controversial papers of the Revolution (continued) Works on government
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“If there is a form of government, then, whose principle and foundation is virtue, will not every sober man acknowledge it better calculated to promote the general happiness than any other form?”

IfsMenGovernmentFormPrinciplesVirtueFoundationAcknowledgeSoberForms Of Government
Book:The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
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“What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual and moral life can be sustained through the new dark ages which are already upon us. And if the tradition of the virtues was able to survive the horrors of the last dark ages, we are not entirely without ground for hope. This time however the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have already been governing us for quite some time.”

IfsMatterAgeAbleLastsFormWaitingCommunityDarkMoralVirtueStageHorrorIntellectualTraditionLocalsConstructionWhat MattersFrontiersCivilityGoverningDark AgesBarbariansMoral Life
Book:After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory
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“Men live in a community in virtue of the things which they have in common; and communication is the way in which they come to possess things in common. What they must have in common in order to form a community or society are aims, beliefs, aspirations, knowledge - a common understanding - likemindedness as the sociologists say.”

MenWayFormOrderBeliefUnderstandingCommunityCommonVirtueCommunicationAimAspirationSociologists
Book:Democracy And Education
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