Quotes About Ends

Don't waste effort on a thing that ends in a petty triumph unless you are happy with a life of petty success

Our civilization is first and foremost a civilization of means; in the reality of modern life, the means, it would seem, are more important than the ends.

Having redefined "success" as the achievement of dramatic technological progress and in general the manipulation of nature to achieve human ends, they essentially won a game the Scholastics were not trying to play in the first place.

Despicable means used to achieve laudable goals render the goals themselves despicable.

How can a universe of mindless matter produce beings with intrinsic ends, self replicating capabilities, and coded chemistry?

A foolish person always thinks that by following and supporting the selfish people can fulfill own wish, but eventually ends up giving them even that which is her/ his.

Anything that name ends with XIN is likely to contain TOXIN-a harmful substance for anybody.

When we deliberate it is about means and not ends.

Every science and every inquiry, and similarly every activity and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good.

The law, or the thoroughly realistic formalization of certain conditions for the self-preservation of a community, forbids certain actions directed against the community. However, it does not forbid the disposition that produces these actions, for it needs these action for other ends.

The use of violent or oppressive means to solve problems is a common feature in both instrumental and idealistic evil. There is an important difference, however, and that is the extent to which the ends justify the means.

To this day it cracks me up to think that my debut on national British television as a reporter ends with me turning a trick.

You can journey to the ends of the earth in search of success, but if you're lucky, you will discover happiness in your own backyard.

We can now see that the fundamental difference between those divergent visions of earth's final kingdom is not about ends, but about means. The imperial kingdom of Rome—and this may indeed apply to any other empire as well—had as its program peace through victory. The eschatological kingdom of God has as its program peace through justice. Both intend peace—one by violence, the other by nonviolence. And still those tectonic plates grind against one another.

Love was merely a tool, smiles were another tool, they were both just tools for accomplishing certain ends. No magic, merely chemicals. I felt I'd never really loved anyone, not Paul, not Chuck the Royal Porcupine, not even Arthur. I'd polished them with my love and expected them to shine, brightly enough to return my own reflection, enhanced and sparkling.

One consequence of the pursuit of an expansive power imaginary is the blurring of the lines separating reality from fancy and truth telling from self-deception and lying. In its imaginary, power is not so much justified as sanctified, excused by the lofty ends it proclaims, ends that commonly are antithetical to the power legitimated by the constitutional imaginary.

horses: dangerous on both ends and crafty in the middle

Dwelling-place and food are useful for life but give it no significance: the immediate goals of the housekeeper are only means, not true ends.

The guiding principle of my life, 'the means are the ends,' has taught me that our participation in a corrupt system facilitates it and corrupts and therefore defeats us.

I work for a Government I despise for ends I think criminal.

The principle that the end justifies the means is and remains the only rule of political ethics; anything else is just a vague chatter and melts away between one's fingers.

Show us not the aim without the way. For ends and means on earth are so entangled That changing one, you change the other too; Each different path brings other ends in view

There are indeed practical men who reject the dignified parts of Government. They say, we want only to attain results, to do business: a constitution is a collection of political means for political ends, and if you admit that any part of a constitution does no business, or that a simpler machine would do equally well what it does, you admit that this part of the constitution, however dignified or awful it may be, is nevertheless in truth useless.

I'm a great player; I'm one of the best defensive ends in the league, and I honestly think that.