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Virtue Quotes

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Virtue Quotes

“I have come to light the lamp of Love in your hearts, to see that it shines day by day with added luster. I have not come on behalf of any exclusive religion. I have not come on a mission of publicity for a sect or creed or cause, nor have I come to collect followers for a doctrine. I have no plan to attract disciples or devotees into my fold or any fold. I have come to tell you of this unitary faith, this spiritual principle, this path of Love, this virtue of Love, this duty of Love, this obligation of Love.”

LoveHeartLightSpiritualCausesPrinciplesVirtuePathPlansDutyShiningMissionsObligationDoctrineFollowersCreedsDiscipleBehalfLampsExclusiveFoldsPublicitySectsDevoteeLusterPath Of Love
Author:Sathya Sai Baba
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“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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“It is a governing principle of nature, that the agency which can produce most good, when perverted from its proper aim, is most productive of evil. It behooves the well-intentioned, therefore, vigorously to watch the tendency of even their most highly prized institutions, since that which was established in the interests of the right, may so easily become the agent of the wrong.”

WellsMayEvilInterestPrinciplesWatchesVirtueSocietyProduceIntegrityAimInstitutionsCorruptionTendenciesAgentsAgencyProductiveGoverning
Author:James F. Cooper
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“I mean that it is more natural for me to be wicked than virtuous, when I do a bad act, and I've done many, I never feel wither shame, remorse or fear, I sometimes wish it was not necessary as I don't like the trouble, but as for any moral sense of principle, I haven't a particle. Many people are like me as actions prove, but they are not so frank in owning it and insist on keeping up the humbug of virtue.”

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Author:Louisa May Alcott
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“A state too expensive in itself, or by virtue of its dependencies, ultimately falls into decay; its free government is transformed into a tyranny; it disregards the principles which it should preserve, and finally degenerates into despotism. The distinguishing characteristic of small republics is stability: the character of large republics is mutability.”

ShouldStatesCharacterGovernmentFallPrinciplesVirtueTyrannyPreservesCharacteristicsExpensiveRepublicStabilityTransformedDecayDisregardDespotismDegeneratesDependencyFree GovernmentMutability
Author:Simon Bolivar
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“There still remains one effort of magnanimity, one sacrifice of prejudice and passion, to be made by the individuals throughout the nation who have heretofore followed the standards of political party. It is that of discarding every remnant of rancor against each other, of embracing as countrymen and friends, and of yielding to talents and virtue alone that confidence which in times of contention for principle was bestowed only upon those who bore the badge of party communion.”

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Author:John Quincy Adams
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“Some authors state that the last stage in this chain of measurements involves "consciousness," or the "intellectual inner life" of the observer, by virtue of the "principle of psycho-physical parallelism." Other authors introduce a wave function for the entire universe. In this book, I shall refrain from using concepts that I do not understand.”

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Author:Asher Peres
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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.”

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Author:Jean Meslier
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“Next, to make them expert in the usefullest points of grammar; and withal to season them and win them early to the love of virtue and true labour, ere any flattering seducement or vain principle seize them wandering, some easy and delightful book of education would be read to them; whereof the Greeks have store, as Cebes, Plutarch, and other Socratic discourses.”

ChildrenBookWould BeNextWinningEasyPrinciplesVirtueSeasonsStoresWanderVainGreekExpertsLabourDiscourseDelightfulGrammarFlatteringSocratic
Book:The Prose Works of John Milton ...: With a Preface, Preliminary Remarks, and Notes
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“Virtue will catch as well as vice by contact; and the public stock of honest manly principle will daily accumulate. We are not too nicely to scrutinize motives as long as action is irreproachable. It is enough (and for a worthy man perhaps too much) to deal out its infamy to convicted guilt and declared apostasy.”

MenWellsLongEnoughActionDealsPrinciplesVirtueToo MuchHonestGuiltVicesWorthyContactMotiveManlyInfamyScrutinizeToo NiceApostasy
Book:The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke: On Conciliation with America; Security of the Independence of Parliament; on Mr. Fox's East India
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“We are His children in Very deed, having been born of Him in the spirit, and we have inherited the very attributes which he possesses. They are in us, and they make us God's embryo, We believe that as we are now God once was, and by the practice of virtue and righteousness, by obedience unto law and authority, He has become what He is, and as He is, man may become, on the same principle.”

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Author:George F. Richards
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“The love of action is a principle of a much stronger and more doubtful nature. It often leads to anger, to ambition, and to revenge; but when it is guided by the sense of propriety and benevolence, it becomes the parent of every virtue, and, if those virtues are accompanied with equal abilities, a family, a state, or an empire may be indebted for their safety and prosperity to the undaunted courage of a single man.”

IfsMenMayStatesActionParentAbilityPrinciplesHistoryVirtueEqualAmbitionStrongerSafetyProsperityRevengeEmpiresBenevolenceDoubtfulRoman EmpireProprietyIndebtedSingle ManUndaunted
Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
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“If what was said in the Ethics is true, that the happy life is the life according to virtue lived without impediment, and that virtue is a mean, then the life which is in a mean, and in a mean attainable by every one, must be the best. And the same principles of virtue and vice are characteristic of cities and of constitutions; for the constitution is in a figure the life of the city.”

IfsMeanSaidLife IsCitiesPrinciplesVirtueFiguresEthicsConstitutionVicesCharacteristicsBeing The BestHappy LifeImpediments
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.”

ThinkingShouldMeanMatterStatesGovernmentFormFoundLostForgetPartyPrinciplesPracticeVirtueDemocracySightExtremesRuinsForms Of GovernmentPresent Day
Book:Politics
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“In [the soul] one part naturally rules, and the other is subject, and the virtue of the ruler we maintain to be different from that of the subject; the one being the virtue of the rational, and the other of the irrational part. Now, it is obvious that the same principle applies generally, and therefore almost all things rule and are ruled according to nature.”

DifferentSoulPrinciplesVirtueSubjectsAll ThingsObviousRationalRulersIrrational
Book:Politics
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“Now the soul of man is divided into two parts, one of which has a rational principle in itself, and the other, not having a rational principle in itself, is able to obey such a principle. And we call a man in any way good because he has the virtues of these two parts.”

MenWayTwoSoulAblePrinciplesVirtueRationalDivided
Book:Complete Works of Aristotle, Volume 2: The Revised Oxford Translation
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“[the virtues] cannot exist without Prudence. A proof of this is that everyone, even at the present day, in defining Virtue, after saying what disposition it is [i.e. moral virtue] and specifying the things with which it is concerned, adds that it is a disposition determined by the right principle; and the right principle is the principle determined by Prudence.”

MoralPrinciplesVirtueConcernedAddDeterminedProofDispositionPrudenceDefiningPresent DayMoral Virtues
Author:Aristotle
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“An essential virtue is humility. ... The principle of humility and prayer leads one to feel a need of divine guidance. Self-reliance is a virtue, but with it should go a consciousness of the need of superior help-a consciousness that as you walk firmly in the pathway of duty, there is a possibility of your making a misstep; and with that consciousness is a prayer, a pleading that God will inspire you to avoid that false step”

NeedsFeelsShouldSelfHelpingPrayerWalksConsciousnessStepsPrinciplesVirtuePossibilityHumilityInspireDivineDutyEssentialsGods WillSuperiorsGuidanceSelf RelianceReliancePathwaysPleadingDivine Guidance
Author:David O. McKay
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“We find that Good and Evil happen alike to all Men on this Side of the Grave; and as the principle Design of Tragedy is to raise Commiseration and Terror in the Minds of the Audience, we shall defeat this great End, if we always make Virtue and Innocence happy and successful.”

IfsMenMindEndsHappensEvilSidesPrinciplesAudienceVirtueSuccessfulDesignCriticismTragedyTheaterRaisesDefeatTerrorGravesInnocenceGood And Evil
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Joseph Addison (Illustrated)
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“Never, I say, had a country so many openings to happiness as this.... Her cause was good. Her principles just and liberal. Her temper serene and firm.... The remembrance then of what is past, if it operates rightly must inspire her with the most laudable of an ambition, that of adding to the fair fame she began with. The world has seen her great adversity.... Let then, the world see that she can bear prosperity; and that her honest virtue in time of peace is equal to the bravest virtue in time of war.”

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Author:Thomas Paine
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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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“Manners or etiquette ('accessibility, affability, politeness, refinement, propriety, courtesy, and ingratiating and captivating behavior') call for no large measure of moral determination and cannot, therefore, be reckoned as virtues. Even though manners are no virtues, they are a means of developing virtue.... The more we refine the crude elements in our nature, the more we improve our humanity and the more capable it grows of feeling the driving force of virtuous principles.”

MeanFeelingsHumanityLanguageForceGrowsMoralPrinciplesVirtueSocietyCommunicationBehaviorElementsCapableDeterminationDrivingMannersDevelopingVirtuousCourtesyEtiquettePolitenessCrudeRefinementProprietyDriving ForceAccessibilityCaptivating
Author:Immanuel Kant
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“[I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue.”

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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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“Human nature itself is evermore an advocate for liberty. There is also in human nature a resentment of injury, and indignation against wrong. A love of truth and a veneration of virtue. These amiable passions, are the "latent spark" . . . If the people are capable of understanding, seeing and feeling the differences between true and false, right and wrong, virtue and vice, to what better principle can the friends of mankind apply than to the sense of this difference?”

PeopleIfsHumansFeelingsPassionUnderstandingDifferencesLibertyPrinciplesVirtueSeeingMankindHuman NatureCapableVicesInjurySparksResentmentFreedom And LibertyFreedom LibertyIndignationLatentAmiableVenerationEvermoreAmerican LibertyTrue And False
Book:Novanglus and Massachusettensis; or, political essays, published in ... 1774 and 1775, on the principal points of controversy, between Great Britain and her colonies; the former by John Adams ... the latter by Jonathan Sewall [or rather, Daniel Leonard] ... To which are added a number of letters lately written by President Adams to the Hon. William Tudor, etc
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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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“If we cherish the virtues and the principles of our fathers, Heaven will assist us to carry on the work of human liberty and human happiness. Auspicious omens cheer us. Great examples are before us. Our own firmament now shines brightly upon our path.”

IfsHumansFatherHeavenLibertyPrinciplesVirtuePathExampleShiningCherishCheerOur FatherPietyOmenHuman HappinessFirmament
Book:The Great Orations and Senatorial Speech of Daniel Webster
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“Thomas Jefferson, the leading Enlightenment figure in the United States, along with Benjamin Franklin, who took exactly the same view, argued that dependence will lead to "subservience and venality", and will "suffocate the germs of virtue". And remember, by dependence he meant wage labor, which was considered an abomination under classical liberal principles.”

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Author:Noam Chomsky
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