Quotes About Ethics

The outcome of an act commonly influences our judgment about its rightness, even though the former was uncertain, while the latter is certain.

Second among the crimina carnis contra naturam is intercourse sexus homogenii/ where the object of sexual inclination continues, indeed, to be human, but is changed since the sexual congress is not heterogeneous but homogeneous, i.e., when a woman satisfies her impulse on a woman, or a man on a man.

All crimina carnis contra naturam debase the human condition below that of the animal, and make man unworthy of his humanity; he then no longer deserves to be a person, and such conduct is the most ignoble and degraded that a man can engage in, with regard to the duties he has towards himself. Suicide is certainly the most dreadful thing that a man can do to himself, but is not so base and ignoble as these crimina carnis contra naturam which are the most contemptible acts a man can commit.

no one can be compelled by law to be beneficent (though he may be taxed and this money then distributed in welfare payments)

The sight of a being who is not graced by any touch of a pure and good will but who yet enjoys an uninterrupted prosperity can never delight a rational and impartial spectator. Thus a good will seems to constitute the indispensable condition of being even worthy of happiness.

Everything goes past like a river and the changing taste and the various shapes of men make the whole game uncertain and delusive. Where do I find fixed points in nature, which cannot be moved by man, and where I can indicate the markers by the shore to which he ought to adhere?

Act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

We] believe, or assume to believe, that [we] satisfy [our] duty to [humanity] if [we] first provide fully for [our] own material wants and then pay [our] tribute to the universal provider by giving a little to the poor. But if [we] were scrupulously just there would be no poor to whom we could give alms and think that we had realized the merit of benevolence. Better than charity, better than giving of our surplus is conscientious and scrupulously fair conduct and a helping hand in need.

Aus so krummem Holze, als woraus der Mensch gemacht ist, kann nichts ganz Gerades gezimmert werden.

We now concern ourselves with a labor less spectacular but nevertheless not unrewarding: that of making the terrain for these majestic moral edifices level and firm enough to be built upon; for under this ground there are all sorts of passageways, such as moles might have dug, left over from reason's vain but confident treasure hunting, that make every building insecure. (A319/B377)

Even philosophers will praise war as ennobling mankind, forgetting the Greek who said: 'War is bad in that it begets more evil than it kills.

O homem, e, duma maneira geral, todo o ser racional, existe como fim em si mesmo, não só como meio para o uso arbitrário desta ou daquela vontade. Pelo contrário, em todas as suas ações, tanto nas que se dirigem a ele mesmo como nas que se dirigem a outros seres racionais, ele tem sempre de ter considerado simultaneamente como fim.

Gustavo Solivellas dice: El que es cruel con los animales se endurece también en su trato con los hombres. Podemos juzgar el corazón de un hombre por su tratamiento de los animales (Immanuel Kant)

Tudo o que não puder contar como fez, não faça!

I should never act in such a way that I could not also will that my maxim should be a universal law.

An action done from duty has its moral worth, not in the purpose to be attained by it, but in the maxim according with which it is decided upon; it depends therefore, not on the realization of the object of action, but solely on the principle of volition in accordance with which, irrespective of all objects of the faculty of desire, the action has been performed.

the doctrine of morals is an autonomy of practical reason, while the doctrine of virtue is at the same time an autocracy of practical reason.

There can be only one reason why we must do what duty demands, and that is that we demand it of ourselves.

L'uomo deve mostrare bontà di cuore verso gli animali, perché chi usa essere crudele verso di essi è altrettanto insensibile verso gli uomini.

T]he sublimity and intrinsic dignity of the command in duty are so much the more evident, the less the subjective impulses favor it and the more they oppose it, without being able in the slightest degree to weaken the obligation of the law or to diminish its validity.

Agisci in modo da considerare l'umanità come scopo, e mai come semplice mezzo.

I express the principle of one's freedom as a human being in this formula: No one can compel me (in accordance with his beliefs about the welfare of others) to be happy after his own fashion.

The possession of power inevitably spoils the free use of reason.

R]eason of itself, independent on all experience, ordains what ought to take place, that accordingly actions of which perhaps the world has hitherto never given an example, the feasibility even if which might be very much doubted by one who founds everything on experience, are nevertheless inflexibly commanded by reason; that, for example, even though there might never yet have been a sincere friend, yet not a whit the less is pure sincerity in friendship required of every man...