Quotes About Virtue

Marvelous, marvelous! All sentient beings have the Tathagata's wisdom and virtue, but they fail to realize it because they cling to deluded thoughts and attachments.

No, the art of government was to curb and guide men's greedy appetites into useful courses, so that, as the Scottish economist Adam Smith proposed, private vice could be public gain. Hamilton

I admit I can't shake the idea that there is virtue in suffering, that there is a sort of psychic economy, whereby if you embrace success, happiness and comfort, these things have to be paid for.

Socrates said that personal fame counts for nothing if your life isn't itself of virtue, and the same goes for political power. We could certainly demand more virtue from our politicians, starting with a more respectful attitude towards each other as legitimately elected members of parliament, and an inflexible commitment to always telling the truth.

There's plenty of symmetry in revenge, but no virtue.

You can always somebody who is worse than you are to make you feel virtuous. It's a cheap shot: those awful terrorists, perverts, communists--they are the ones who need to repent! Yes, indeed they do, and for them repentance will be a full-time job, exactly as it is for all the rest of us.

Honor and dignity of man is only in virtue and piety.

The superior man acquaints himself with many sayings of antiquity and many deeds of the past, in order to strengthen his character thereby.

Virtue comes through contemplation of the divine, and the exercise of philosophy. But it also comes through public service. The one is incomplete without the other. Power without wisdom is tyranny; wisdom without power is pointless.

Diplomacy and virtue do not make easy companions.

Without temptation what value is virtue?

Escape, son, may not be the way," says Mr. Spider. "It would be reassuring if everything was finally reducible to Light versus Darkness, Order versus Chaos, Good versus Evil. However, life is not pulp fantasy. If the Way were easy, what virtue would there be in following it? The teaching of the Daishi is that the Way does not lie in escape, or even in defeating.

Bad Men Do What Good Men

Quite possibly one of the most revealing passages about Shakespeare as a man comes from one of the roughest of the jottings made by gossip John Aubrey from his interview with William Beeston, son of the Christopher Beeston who had acted with Shakespeare's company. The partly cancelled note reads: 'the more to be admired, he was not a company keeper. [He] ... wouldn't be debauched, and if invited to, writ [i.e. wrote] he was in pain.' [Ch.24]

Sometimes it sucks, being good, because if you make a mistake then everybody makes a mistake and if something goes wrong it's your fault, it falls on your shoulders.

Virtue knows no color line, and the chivalry which depends upon complexion of skin and texture of hair can command no honest respect.

If you are 'humble', it may help you in ordinary life. If you are not, you will get nowhere in higher things.

Great men are great until they know it. Saints are holy until they know it.

Feeling important is a vice, not a virtue, however concealed as participation in something noble.

Teach honesty by all means - you do know what it is, don't you?

The real generosity is when a man does something generous when nobody knows about it.

It has truly been said that 'Humility is not so much a virtue as a necessity, in order to learn.

Day and Night The night is long: do not shorten it by sleep. The day is fair: do not darken it with wrongdoing.

Bueno. Muéstrame a una persona que cree que sabe lo que es "bueno" y probablemente seré capaz de mostrarte a una persona horrorosa. Muéstrame a una persona que realmente sabe lo que es "bueno" y te mostraré que casi nunca usa la palabra.