Quotes About Morality

What constitutes virtue, Mrs Graham? Is it the circumstance of being able and willing to resist temptation; or that of having no temptations to resist?

However little you may esteem them as individuals, it is not pleasant to be looked upon as a liar and a hypocrite. To be thought to practice what you abhor. And to encourage the vices you would discountenance. To find your good intentions frustrated and your hands crippled by your supposed unworthiness, and to bring disgrace on the principles you profess.

No one cares for the exterior.

The best way to enjoy yourself is to do what is right and hate nobody.

Let your eyes be blind to all external attractions, your ears deaf to all the fascinations of flattery and light discourse.—These are nothing—and worse than nothing—snares and wiles of the tempter, to lure the thoughtless to their own destruction.

Its easily done, replied he, with a faint smile, bordering on a sneer: to abuse your friend and knock him on the head, without any assignable cause, and then tell him the deed was not quite correct, but it's no matter whether he pardons it or not.

In Wildfell Hall, moral disease has become a norm.

What is it that constitutes virtue, Mrs. Graham?  Is it the circumstance of being able and willing to resist temptation; or that of having no temptations to resist?

It is nonsense to talk about injuring no one but yourself ... Without injuring hundreds, if not thousands, besides, in a greater or less degree, either by the evil you do or the good you leave undone.

Šta stvara vrlinu, gospo?o Grejam? Da li sposobnost i volja da se ?ovek odupre iskušenju, ili nepostojanje iskušenja?

As he frequently came to course or shoot over his brother-in-law's grounds, he would bring his favourite dogs with him; and he treated them so brutally that, poor as I was, I would have given a sovereign any day to see one of them bite him, provided the animal could have done it with impunity.

he still maintained that she had done wrong to leave her husband; it was a violation of her sacred duties as a wife, and a tempting of Providence by laying herself open to temptation; and nothing short of bodily ill--usage (and that of no trifling nature) could excuse such a step - nor even that, for in such a case she ought to appeal to the laws for portection.

but if I hate the sins I love the sinner

I wished to tell the truth, for truth always conveys its own moral to those who are able to receive it.

How noble and good everyone could be if, every evening before falling asleep, they were to recall to their minds the events of the whole day and consider exactly what has been good and bad. Then without realizing it, you try to improve yourself at the start of each new day.

People can so easily be tempted by slackness... and by money.

And yet not every sense of what's good and right can be trusted, for what else is war but two sides going to battle over what each thinks is right?

Quite honestly, I can't imagine how anyone can say: I'm weak, and then remain so. After all, if you know it, why not fight against it, why not try to train your character? The answer was: Because it's so much easier not to! This reply rather discouraged me. Easy? Does that mean that a lazy, deceitful life is an easy life? Oh no, that can't be true, it mustn't be true, people can so easily be tempted by slackness... and by money.

How noble and good everyone could be if, at the end of each day, they were to review their own behavior and weigh up the rights and wrongs. They would automatically try to do better at the start of each new day and, after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal. Everyone is welcome to this prescription; it costs nothing and is definitely useful. Those who don't know will have to find out by experience that "a quiet conscience gives you strength!

Realizar una cosa fácil no demanda ningún esfuerzo. Hay que practicar el bien y trabajar para merecer la dicha, y no se llega a ella a través de la especulación y la pereza. La pereza seduce, el trabajo satisface.

Because still, in spite of everything, I have not enough faith in God. He has given me so much - which I certainly do not deserve - and I still do so much that is wrong every day.

All's fair in love and war.

How noble and good everyone could be if, at the end of each day, they were to review their own behavior and weigh up the rights and wrongs. They would automatically try to do better at the start of each new day and, after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal.

to do better at the start of each new day and, after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal. Everyone is welcome to this prescription; it costs nothing and is definitely useful. Those who don't know will have to find out by experience that "a quiet conscience gives you strength!" Yours, Anne M. Frank