Quotes About Ethics

I do not always observe the rules of society, but I am quite aware of what they are!

I believe morality is universal. Circumstances may alter the degree of blame, but not that an act is wrong.

One man's sin does not justify another's.

Those who stand by and watch are complicit in what they could have stopped but chose not to.

Because I don't believe in monsters," she said frankly. "Evil men, certainly, and madness, but not monsters.

We all know that things go on we'd sooner not think about, an' most folk mind their own affairs. But if yer forced ter know, then yer forced ter do summink.

without honor and kindness there are no rituals in the world that make any difference

there are none as virtuous as those who have never been asked.

That without honor and kindness there are no rituals in the world that make any difference," he replied. "The rest is detail. Do whatever seems beautiful or of comfort to you.

Oi didn't loike that bloke, Captain. Bastard, 'e were, but Oi s'pose rules is for them yer don't loike. Yer won't 'urt them as yer do. In't that what God's about, been fair to them as rubs your coat all the wrong way?

That you have one set of rules for yourselves, and another for us

This time it was Daniel who interrupted. "What's always right?" "Kindness," Pitt answered with certainty. "Keeping your promises. Not giving up just because it gets hard. Owning up to your mistakes, and not blaming other people even if you would get away with it.

You do not need to believe evil, only to use its methods. You will get accustomed to them, until eventually they are not your last choice, but your first. For awhile, you can justify it to yourself, and then eventually you will not bother. You have forgotten what you are fighting for; now winning is the only objective! And the more you win, the more you justify it, until the whole idea of right and wrong disappears and only winning matters.

Which was worse, to intrude or to pretend not to have seen, because you had no idea what to do?

Es terrible traicionar a tu país. Me cuesta imaginar algo peor, salvo quizá traicionarte a ti mismo. El

What you see, and allow without a fight, is what you become yourself. What is the moral difference between the man who burns his neighbor to death, and the man who stands by and watches him do it?

One person's ideals sometimes endanger someone else's privileges.

The more flawed a man was, the shoddier it was to take advantage of his inadequacies to destroy him.

And what constitutes evil, real evil, is the taking of a single human life. Whether a man would die tomorrow or the day after or eventually... it doesn't matter. Because if God does not exist, then life... every second of it... Is all we have.

I was good and bad, but never wicked.

Heaven would be Hell in no time if every cruel, selfish, vicious soul went to Heaven.

When you find out there is no ultimate good and evil in which you can place your faith, the world does not fall apart at the seams. It simply means that every decision is more difficult, more critical, because you are creating the good and evil yourself and they are very real.

so important to believe in a concept of goodness, even if we make it up ourselves. We don't really make it up. it's there, isn't it? Oh, yes, it's there, she said. It's there because we put it there.

Aren't there gradations of evil? Is evil a great perilous gulf into which one falls with the first sin, plummeting to the depth?