Quotes About Ethics

Every man's happiness is built on the unhappi-ness of another.

It's motive alone which gives character to the actions of men.

Bold knaves thrive without one grain of sense, But good men starve for want of impudence.

An excellent man, like precious metal, is in every way invariable; A villain, like the beams of a balance, is always varying, upwards and downwards.

No circumstances can make it necessary for a man to burst in sunder all the ties of humanity.

It is a very good world to live in, To lend or to spend, or to live in; but to beg or to borrow, or to get a man's own, It is the very worst world that ever was known.

Every man is to be considered in two capacities, the private and public; as designed to pursue his own interest, and likewise to contribute to the good of others.

From men motivated by moral certitude, history teaches, no lasting good ever comes.

Loyalty is a good for the loyal man; but it may be mischievous for those whom his cause assails.

Men have never been good, they are not good and they never will be good.

When a man is treated like a beast, he says, 'After all, I'm human.' When he behaves like a beast, he says 'After all, I'm only human.

Men are often bad, but babies never are.

There is but one thing of real value - to cultivate truth and justice, and to live without anger in the midst of lying and unjust men.

Every man should bear his own grievances rather than detract from the comforts of another.

Choice is the essence of ethics: if there were no choice there would be no ethics, no good, no evil; good and evil have meaning only insofar as man is free to choose.

I am not an economist. I am an honest man!

A good man enlarges the term of his own existence.

But no man has a monopoly of conscience.

The worse the man the better the soldier. If soldiers be not corrupt they ought to be made so.

The conscience is the sacred haven of the liberty of man.

Recognition should come to the reporter who uncovers public cheating or proves a convicted man innocent.

Wherever it has been established that it is shameful to be involved with sexual relationships with men, that is due to evil on the part of the rulers, and to cowardice on the part of the governed.

The agricultural population produces the bravest men, the most valiant soldiers,46 and a class of citizens the least given of all to evil designs.

A companion is but another self; wherefore it is an argument that a man is wicked if he keep company with the wicked.