Quotes About Conscience

He had a sense of foreboding. No sense of wrong or sin; he was troubled by no conscience in that respect. He knew that conscience was chiefly fear of society, or fear of oneself. He was not afraid of himself. But he was quite consciously afraid of society, which he knew by instinct to be a malevolent, partly-insane beast.

Lincoln did not belong to any church, and avoided religious discussions even with his best friends. However, he once told Herndon that his religious code was like that of an old man named Glenn, in Indiana, whom he had heard speak at a church meeting, and who said: "When I do good, I feel good, when I do bad I feel bad, and that's my religion.

there was no shorthand for I'm sorry. You were obliged to speak those two words.

Hunger and fear are excellent casuists.

It was a reign of minority, when the strongest had the best right, and when acts of usurpation were frequent amongst those who had much power and little conscience.

knew that one person with a conscience could make a difference and I was that person. Why not?

It felt like there was a dark spot in my heart. Like a bruise. And it was getting deeper and wider with every lie I told.

Of two evils choose neither.

In a multitude of cases, and in all cases where regeneration is spoken of, it means the whole soul; that is, it includes the intellect, will, and the conscience as well as the affections. Hence the Bible speaks of the eyes, of the thoughts, of the purposes, of the devices, as well as of the feelings or affections of the heart. In Scriptural language, therefore, a 'new heart' does not mean simply a new state of feeling, but a radical change in the state of the whole soul or interior man.

We all sin, of course, but the unwillingness to take any responsibility for our sins implies a more deeply damaged spirit.

There are two freedoms — the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where he is free to do what he ought.

There are two freedoms -- the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where he is free to do what he ought.

The Russian Revolution and its imitators (Chinese, Cuban, Vietnamese, Cambodian) tried to atomize society so thoroughly--to war against the mediating structures that stand between the individual and the state--that the most basic bonds of family, faith, fellowship and conscience came to near dissolution.

Guilt is the uncomfortable or painful feeling that results from doing something that violates or breaks a personal standard or value, or from hurting another person, or even from breaking an agreement or a law. Guilt thus concerns our behavior, feeling bad about what we have done, or about what we didn't do that we were supposed to have done.

A poor relation is the most irrelevant thing in nature, a piece of impertinent correspondence, an odious approximation, a haunting conscience, a preposterous shadow, lengthening in the noon-tide of our prosperity. He is known by his knock.

In his other great treatise, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith argued that human conscience comes from social relationships, and that the natural empathy produced by being among other people is an essential part of well-being and should guide our actions.

paying taxes is a cheap price for a quiet conscience—much cheaper than actually having to get involved in the lives of their fellow citizens.

The wicked flee when none pursueth.

As evil grows through many small acts of wrongdoing, good develops as we continue to do what is right before God and others.

A conscience enlightened, and yet a heart erratic, make mankind a bundle of marvelous incongruities and inconsistencies.

When the church aligns itself politically, it gives priority to the compromises and temporal successes of the political world rather than its Christian confession of eternal truth. And when the church gives up its rightful place as the conscience of the culture, the consequences for society can be horrific.

As we seek what is possible, we must also seek what is right, and we must not forget that even the most noble ends do not justify any means.

Only a church free of any outside domination can be the conscience of society and, as Washington pastor Myron Augsburger has written, "hold government morally accountable before God to live up to its own claims."21

Who is to decide what are the 'right' values?" wrote a professor of education. "Does ultimate moral authority lie with institutions such as church and state to codify and impose? Or, in a free society, are these matters of private conscience, with final choice belonging to the individual?"2