Quotes About Goodness

No man ought to despise or in any way injure another man without urgent cause: and, consequently, unless we have evident indications of a person's wickedness, we ought to deem him good, by interpreting for the best whatever is doubtful about him.

But the perfection of divine goodness is found in one simple thing

The act that anything evil puts forth is due to the strength of goodness, but a deficient goodness. For if there were nothing of good there, neither would there be any being, nor any action: again, if the goodness were not deficient, neither would there be any evil.

Esto es parte de la bondad infinita de Dios, que Él debe permitir que el mal exista, y de él se produzca el bien.

This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good.

Therefore, as the divine wisdom is the cause of the distinction of things for the sake of the perfection of the universe, so it is the cause of inequality. For the universe would not be perfect if only one grade of goodness were found in things.

Hence it is predicated chiefly of the virtuous; then of the pleasant; and lastly of the useful.

His argument runs like this: there is no goodness without free will. Without the ability to freely choose-or reject-the good, an individual possesses no control over his own soul, and without that control, there is not possibility of attaining grace. In the language of Christianity, a beliver cannot be saved unless the choice to follow Christ is freely made, unless the option not to follow him genuinely exists. Compelled belief is no belief at all.

The most urgent and demanding question for Christian believers is not whether "a supreme being of some kind" exists, but rather whether this incomparably good and powerful and compassionate source and end of all things truly is as revealed in Scripture

Virtue is like health: the harmony of the whole man.

Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure there is one less rascal in the world.

The man of life upright has a guiltless heart, free from all dishonest deeds or thought of vanity.

Secrecy is the element of all goodness even virtue, even beauty is mysterious.

No man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad.

Nothing that was worthy in the past departs no truth or goodness realized by man ever dies, or can die.

Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure that there is one rascal less in the world.

The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.

Having wealth is damaging to the pursuit of the kingdom because the very having does something to one's inner life, one's very ability to love God for his own goodness and others in and for him.

I didn't realize it until I was grown how necessary it is for good people to be tough.

If human beings are fundamentally good, no government is necessary; if they are fundamentally bad, any government, being composed of human beings, would be bad also.

I don't do negative things.

I don't focus on negativity, I focus on the good things.

No evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death. He and his are not neglected by the gods.

Man's nature is fundamentally good, or perhaps it is neither good nor evil. In any case, man is something to work on. We must hold fast to this fact - man is something to work on.