Quotes About Virtue

Be a pattern to others, and then all will go well; for as a whole city is affected by the licentious passions and vices of great men, so it is likewise reformed by their moderation.

Many among men are they who set high the show of honor, yet break justice.

Try first to be a man of value; success will follow.

The character of covetousness, is what a man generally acquires more through some niggardliness or ill grace in little and inconsiderable things, than in expenses of any consequence.

Education and morals will be found almost the whole that goes to make a good man.

Knowing what is right does not make a sagacious man.

Excellence or virtue in a man will be the disposition which renders him a good man and also which will cause him to perform his function well.

Perhaps here we have a clue to the reason why royal rule used to exist formerly, namely the difficulty of finding enough men of outstanding virtue.

Men are good in but one way, but bad in many.

A brave man is clear in his discourse, and keeps close to truth.

The good man is he for whom, because he is virtuous, the things that are absolutely good are good; it is also plain that his use of these goods must be virtuous and in the absolute sense good.

The virtue of the good man is necessarily the same as the virtue of the citizen of the perfect state.

Like pictures, men should be judged by their merits and not by their defects.

Good men but see death, the wicked taste it.

Men that talk of their own benefits are not believed to talk of them because they have done them, but to have done them because they might talk of them.

The honest Man takes Pains, and then enjoys Pleasures; the knave takes Pleasure, and then suffers Pains.

No man is bound to be rich or great, - no, nor to be wise; but every man is bound to be honest.

Amongst the sons of men how few are known Who dare be just to merit not their own.

The superior man does what is proper to the station in which he is; he does not desire to go beyond this.

When a man's knowledge is sufficient to attain, and his virtue is not sufficient to enable him to hold, whatever he may have gained, he will lose again.

The superior man has a dignified ease without pride. The mean man has pride without a dignified ease.

A person of character takes as much trouble to discover what is right as the lesser men take to discover what will pay.

The man of upright life is obeyed before he speaks.

If a superior man abandon virtue, how can he fulfil the requirements of that name?