Quotes about Moral Principles

If you think it's worth selling yourself out, go for it. But I'm not selling myself out so I can make a little more money. I'm not selling my character out for that.

I cannot ask of heaven success, even for my country, in a cause where she should be in the wrong. My toast would be, may our country be always successful, but whether successful or otherwise always right. I disclaim as unsound all patriotism incompatible with the principles of eternal justice.

A moral system valid for all is basically immoral.

I do not refute ideals, I merely put on gloves when I deal with them...

There are ultimately only two possible adjustments to life; one is to suit our lives to principles; the other is to suit principles to our lives. If we do not live as we think, we soon begin to think as we live. The method of adjusting moral principles to the way men live is just a perversion of the order of things.

Moral principles do not depend on a majority vote. Wrong is wrong, even if everybody is wrong. Right is right, even if nobody is right.

The method of adjusting moral principles to the way men live is just such a perversion of the due order of things.

Start with what is right rather than what is acceptable.

When about to commit a base deed, respect thyself, though there is no witness.

An offensive war, I believe to be wrong and would therefore have nothing to do with it, having no right to meddle with another man's property, his ox or his ass, his man servant or his maid servant or anything this is his.

I believe in doing the right things; that is my character and personality.

The natural law is an instrument for progress, not a weapon of revolution.

You know, you don't retreat in the defense of freedom. You don't retreat in the defense of moral government and limited government. You don't retreat because people are going to defend bad things.

The more integrity you have the more humanity will offend you, the less integrity you have the less offensive humanity will be to you.

Here's the thing about values: You have to use words to identify them, but they won't create true value for you unless they turn into consistent behaviors.

Wisdom is knowledge of good and bad; courage is knowledge of what to fear and what not to fear; moderation is knowledge of what to pursue and what to avoid; justice is knowledge of what to give or what not to give others.

What good is it to throw yourself in front of a steamroller out of moral principles and then be crushed flat like a sock emptied of its foot? Better to fade into the crowd, the piously praising, unctuous, hate-mongering crowd. Better to hurl rocks than to have them hurled at you. Or better for your chances of staying alive.

History has shown us time and again that what is right is not what is popular.

Morals do not come from the state and society. Morality deals with weightier matters that measure our thoughts, words, and deeds against universals that are true regardless of time and place.

We don't necessarily stand by our faults every time, but we will always stand by our methodologies and ethos.

That you have one set of rules for yourselves, and another for us

There is a set of rules and a code of conduct that I believe that you should adhere to in life.

There is only one morality, as there is only one geometry.

Whether there be any such moral principles, wherein all men do agree, I appeal to any who have been but moderately conversant in the history of mankind, and looked abroad beyond the smoke of their own chimneys.