Quotes About Principles

Getting Things Done is not some new technology or invention—it simply makes explicit the principles at work within what we all do implicitly. But with that awareness, you can then leverage those principles consciously to create more elegant results.

The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.

As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.

As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble. —Ralph Waldo Emerson

The game of work and the business of life are really the same thing, when it comes down to the principles and behaviors and techniques that eliminate distraction and foster beneficial focus.

Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex and intelligent behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple and stupid behavior.

Whereas purpose provides the juice and the direction, principles define the parameters of action and the criteria for excellence of behavior.

Call it curiosity. Call it instinct. And I am a man who has followed his instincts. —I thought it was principles. —In my experience, they're one and the same.

In driving for cultural change, it's a mistake to become overly constrained by your desired culture as you've defined it. Are there any other, related behaviors, values, or principles that support high performance than the ones you've formally adopted? If so, don't hesitate to push these as well.

most people need to believe in something. There are a few who don't, but they're a bit unusual.

I realized then that if I could teach my children only one or two basic principles, tolerance would be one of them.

Three basic investment principles inform asset-allocation decisions in well-constructed portfolios. First, long-term investors build portfolios with a pronounced equity bias. Second, careful investors fashion portfolios with substantial diversification. Third, sensible investors create portfolios with concern for tax considerations. The principles of equity orientation, diversification, and tax sensitivity find support both in common sense and academic theory.

That is why we must come back to our first principles. And the most basic of these is the fact that God is there and that he is objective to us. He is not there to conform to us; we must conform to him. He summons us from outside of ourselves to know him. We do not go inside of ourselves to find him. We are summoned to know him only on his terms. He is not known on our terms. This summons is heard in and through his Word. It is not heard through our intuitions.

It is better that you die than that you put a stain upon your soul.

Follow your honest convictions, and stay strong.

For I can raise no money by vile means: By heaven, I had rather coin my heart, And drop my blood for drachmas, than to wring From the hard hands of peasants their vile trash 75By any indirection.

It is always more easy to discover and proclaim general principles than to apply them.

2. We must never cease to proclaim in fearless tones the great principles of freedom and the rights of man which through Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights, the Habeas Corpus, trial by jury, and the English common law find their most famous expression in the American Declaration of Independence.

He wondered if the real world was that one in which men fought for policies and principles and died or lived gloriously - or more often miserably - for the sake of an abstract word like patriotism or independence, or if reality belonged to the humble people and the common land.

In order to destroy this system which we so much detest we are creating conditions over here which run contrary to our dearest p-principles.

I don't like mixing up moralities with mathematics.

we must not let our standards be determined by the gentlemen of the oposition

I was so untutored as to suppose that all I had to do was to think out what was right and express it fearlessly.

When we have degenerated, as we must eventually degenerate, when we have lost our intrinsic superiority…our morals will be gone, but our Maxims will remain.