Quotes About Virtue

If I could put it into a very few words, dear sir, I should say that our prevalent belief is in moderation. We inculcate the virtue of avoiding excesses of all kinds—even including, if you will pardon the paradox, excess of virtue itself.

Laziness in doing stupid things can be a great virtue Chang - Lost Horizon (1933)

Laziness in doing stupid things can be a great virtue...

It should be our acts that remain after us, the whakairo remind us, not our vainglory. Humility is seen as a vital part of a well-adjusted character.

For to die with honour is far better than to live disgraced.

Humility is not a virtue in a writer, it is an absolute necessity.

Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks -- no form of government can render us secure. To suppose liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea. If there be sufficient virtue and intelligence in the community, it will be exercised in the selection of these men. So that we do not depend on their virtue, or put confidence in our rulers, but in the people who are to choose them.

To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.

The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust.

Joy is the noblest human act. —ST. THOMAS AQUINAS

Twice a day, or at least once, make your particular examens. Be careful never to omit them. So live as to make more account of your own good conscience than you do of those of others; for he who is not good in regard to himself, how can he be good in regard to others?

Industry in art is a necessity—not a virtue—and any evidence of the same, in the production, is a blemish, not a quality; a proof, not of achievement, but of absolutely insufficient work, for work alone will efface the footsteps of work.

Fairest and best adorned is she Whose clothing is humility.

Few are guided by principle any longer, only by what they prefer. "You have to decide what's right for you," we are told. In such a climate, the only remaining virtue is tolerance, and the only philosophies that are wrong are those that believe in truth.

Above all, the Stoics sought wisdom, a condition that I myself hope to achieve after I stop wrecking and burning things.

Mankind's moral sense is not a strong beacon light, radiating outward to illuminate in sharp outline all that it touches. It is, rather, a small candle flame, casting vague and multiple shadows, flickering and sputtering in the strong winds of power and passion, greed and ideology. But brought close to the heart and cupped in one's hands, it dispels the darkness and warms the soul.

If the moral senses can conflict with one another and with what prudent action requires under particular circumstances, then living a good life requires striking a delicate balance among those senses and between them and prudent self-interest.

Consistency, say some, is the sign of a small mind, but it's a real virtue with high-power technology. Having lots of the same devices out in the field lets us compile a record of experience.

They were doing what they thought they had to do. Their intentions were as good as those of most political and religious purists. In the time of Julius Caesar, Brutus was known as the most moral man in Rome. Whenever we think of what he did and of what then became of him, we are reminded that unduly virtuous men can be as great a danger to themselves and their own causes as they are to their adversaries.

Only the actions of the justSmell sweet and blossom in their dust.

There is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it ill behaves any of us to find fault with the rest of us.

No siempre se saca el bien de las buenas obras ni el mal de las malas obras. Ni siquiera los sabios y los buenos pueden ver la finalidad de todas sus acciones.

the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues.