Quotes About Ethics

The point is, there is no feasible excuse for what are, for what we have made of ourselves. We have chosen to put profits before people, money before morality, dividends before decency, fanaticism before fairness, and our own trivial comforts before the unspeakable agonies of others.

God forbid that I should ever suffer the shame of publishing a book for money, or of having one of my family so demean themselves. How can one tell who might read it? No worthy book has ever been written for gain, I think;

Olivier took a deep breath, then turned and bowed in farewell. Gersonides nodded in return, then thought of something. The manuscript you brought me, by that bishop. It argues that understanding is more important than movement. That action is virtuous only if it reflects pure comprehension, and that virtue comes from the comprehension, not the action. Olivier frowned. So? Dear boy, I must tell you a secret. What? I do believe it is wrong.

I (John Stone) have never had any great desire to abolish poverty or save fallen women; I am, and always have been, deeply suspicious of those who wish to do these things. They normally cause more harm than good and, in my experience, their desire for power, to control others, is very much greater than that of any businessman. p 455 Stone's Fall

Men reacted as they always did; some with an extreme of generosity, giving what little they could spare to strangers; others behaved with an equal and opposite extreme of harshness, demanding outrageous things in exchange. Honest men became thieves, honest women prostitutes, criminals became saints, all driven onward by an idea of what they were leaving behind.

How do we justify calling ourselves civilised, after all? Is it the books we read? The delicacy of our tastes? Our place in continuing a line of belief ando of common values which strech back a thousand years and more? All this, indeed, but what does it mean? How does it show itself? Are you civilised if you read the right books, yet stand by while your neighbours ara massacred, your lanas laid waste, your cities brought to ruin?»

We had become inured to the most horrendous of sins, and thought of them as instruments of policy.

I knew salesmen, they made good murderers.

Right knowledge, of itself, EVIDENTLY does not bring about moral transformation in human beings - even supposing that right knowledge is something we are predisposed to desire in the first place. It is possible to be highly educated and at the same time morally depraved. There is, in fact, a certain kind of moral depravity that only the highly educated can attain, because it requires sophisticated skills of rationalization and self-deception.

Surround yourself with human beings, my dear James. They are easier to fight for than principles.' He laughed. 'But don't let me down and become human yourself. We would lose such a wonderful machine.

Those who deserve to die, die the death they deserve.

Those who deserve to die, he paused, 'die the death they deserve' - Mr Big

W]hen one's young, it seems very easy to distinguish between right and wrong, but as one gets older it becomes more difficult. At school it's easy to pick out one's own villains and heroes and one grows up wanting to be a hero and kill the villains.

There might be cheats or possible cheats amongst them, men who beat their wives, men with perverse instincts, greedy men, cowardly men, lying men; but the elegance of the room invested each one with a kind of aristocracy.

Her breasts were showing and Mr. Player, who was a very strong Quaker, didn't think that was quite proper.

Bond frowned. 'It's not difficult to get a Double O number if you're prepared to kill people,' he said. 'That's all the meaning it has. It's nothing to be particularly proud of.

Because people are very careful with the secrets of their own business doesn't mean that they'll be careful with the secrets of yours.

However that may be, it is clear that he could have found many investments more savoury than prostitution, if he had not been tempted by the by-product of unlimited women for his personal use. Fate rebuked him with terrifying swiftness.

Surround yourself with human beings, my dear James. They are easier to fight for than principles.' He laughed. 'But don't let me down and become human yourself. We would lose such a wonderful machine.' With a wave of the hand he shut the door. 'Hey,' shouted Bond. But the footsteps went quickly off down the passage.

It was the puritan in him that couldn't take it.

Those who deserve to die,' he paused, 'die the death they deserve.

America's a civilized country. More or less.

Most creatures kill for food. We don't all kill for greed, money, land, jealousy, oil, power, ego, or God. Only man has figured that out. In the last century alone we've slaughtered some 108 million people, and 150 million to 1 billion throughout human history. Yet, we still refer to what we've got going on here as "civilization." And

It was always the view of my parents, Emily said, that hot weather encouraged loose morals among young people.