Quotes About Virtue

no man is superior, unless it was by merit, and no man is inferior, unless by his demerit.

In Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress," he began, "you may recall the description of the Man with the Muck-rake, the man who could look no way but downward." Bunyan's muckraker, he suggested, "typifies the man who in this life consistently refuses to see aught that is lofty, and fixes his eyes with solemn intentness only on that which is vile and debasing.

humility is the first and greatest of virtues.

Lion-hearted; her tremors braced with virtue, Philippa trotted on.

Though whether the mass murder of strangers for one's principles ranks higher in virtue than attacking one's neighbours for the hell of it is a point I'm glad I don't have to settle.

Lymond, left to speak first, said agreeably, Quite so. I, King of Flesh, flourishing in my flowers. Come in. I am sensible, sober, and have no designs on your virtue.

He's s o damned moral that he ought to be standing rear up under a Bo Tree.

Humility is a virtue Scotsmen require to be taught.

Damn it, she writes detective stories and in detective stories virtue is always triumphant. They're the purest literature we have.

Detachment is a rare virtue, and very few people find it lovable, either in themselves or in others. If you ever find a person who likes you in spite of it-still more, because of it-that liking has very great value, because it is perfectly sincere, and because, with that person, you will never need to be anything but sincere yourself.

Here again, the souls 'have what they chose'; they enjoy that kind of after-life which they themselves imagined for the virtuous dead; their failure lay in not imagining better. They are lost because they 'had not faith' — primarily the Christian faith, but also, more generally, faith in the nature of things.

G. K. Chesterton says,' put in Wimsey, 'that most people with a very well-defined style write at times what looks like bad parodies of themselves. He mentions Swinburne, for instance – that bit about "From the lilies and languors of virtue to the raptures and roses of vice.

of my own honesty.

the mirror of his own magnanimity.

a patient man is better than a warrior.

Exposing hypocrisy doesn't make you a moral person

Moreover, one should so respect a friend's presence that he dare not perform anything shameful or speak any unbecoming word, since any fault so reflects on a friend that the friend not only blushes and grieves inwardly but also reproaches himself with what he sees or hears, as if he had committed the sin himself.

I would far rather be ignorant than knowledgeable of evil.

Whoever is just willingly and without compulsion will not lack happiness; he will never be utterly destroyed.

Neither a life of anarchy nor one beneath a despot should you praise; to all that lies in the middle a god has given excellence.

When strength and justice are true yoke-fellows, where can be found a mightier pair than they?

For in pure maidens, knowing not the marriage-bed, the glance of the eyes sinks from shame.

When strength is yoked with justice, where is a mightier pair than they?

God's most lordly gift to man is decency of mind.