Quotes About Ethics

The law is where you buy it and what you pay for it.

You know what's wrong with this country, baby?...A man can't stay honest if he wants to...he gets chiseled out of his pants if he does. You play the game dirty or you don't eat.

No trial, no sensational headlines, no mud-slinging just to sell newspapers without the slightest regard for truth or fair play or for the feelings of innocent people.

What kind of work do you do mostly?" "Anything that's reasonably honest

Take it easy, Doc. Around here we only hit our wives in private.

I am quite sure he would not spoil a virgin; if he is a man of honor in one thing, he is that in all things.

Eddie Mars would have been very unlikely to involve himself in a double murder just because another man had gone to town with the blonde he was not even living with. It might have annoyed him, but business is business, and you have to hold your teeth clamped around Hollywood to keep from chewing on stray blondes.

Then I sat there holding the neck of the cool bottle and wondering how it would feel to be a homicide dick and find bodies lying around and not mind at all, not have to sneak out wiping doorknobs, not have to ponder how much I could tell without hurting a client and how little I could tell without too badly hurting myself. I decided I wouldn't like it.

In our time we have seen a shocking decline in both public and private morals. You can't expect quality from people whose lives are a subjection to a lack of quality.

In our time we have seen a shocking decline in both public and private morals. You can't expect quality from people whose lives are a subjection to a lack of quality. You can't have quality with mass production. You don't want it because it lasts too long.

That's the difference between crime and business. For business you gotta have capital. Sometimes I think it's the only difference.

If he is a man on honor in one thing, he is that in all things.

Esa es la diferencia entre delito y negocio. Para los negocios necesitas capital. A veces me parece que es la única diferencia.

Right,' I said. 'Tell that to your coppers next time they shoot down some scared petty larceny crook running away up an alley with a stolen spare.

Their constant yelping about a free press means, with a few honorable exceptions, freedom to peddle scandal, crime, sex, sensationalism, hate, innuendo, and the political and financial uses of propaganda. A newspaper is a business out to make money through advertising revenue. That is predicated on its circulation and you know what the circulation depends on.

The rules are clean: they are right, I ween But where do they make the thing?

Why? Why do you care what happens to scum like them?' De Loungville moved his horse alongside Erik's, so he was almost nose-to-nose with Erik when he answered. 'I don't care what happens to scum like them. You could cut off a piece at a time over a week and I wouldn't give a whore's promise for what it would do to them. But I do care what it would do to you, Erik.

power in and of itself is neither worthy of respect nor fear; it simply is. It is how power is employed, and towards what ends, that ennobles or denigrates the wielder of power.

Never think taking a life is easy. Do that and in a way they win.

No, killing a man is fairly easy. It is killing him and not getting caught that makes it difficult.

Besides, it seems to mee that spreading the doctrine of doing good can harm no one.' Nakor shook his head. 'Would that it were true. Men have been put to death for preaching good.

Besides, it seems to me that spreading the doctrine of doing good can harm no one.' Nakor shook his head. 'Would that it were true. Men have been put to death for preaching good.

I am not a learned man. I have read a certain amount, enough to know I know very little. But I have read enough to have some sense that all men think of themselves as heroes, at least heroes of their own lives, and that no man who did evil thought he was doing such.

you can't cheat an honest man,' and an honest man admits his own shortcomings.