Quotes About Ethics

My heart dropped directly into my stomach. And I cursed those fucking goatherds to hell, and myself for not executing them when every military codebook ever written had taught me otherwise. Not to mention my own raging instincts, which had told me to go with Axe and execute them. And let the liberals go to hell in a mule cart, and take with them all of their fucking know-nothing rules of etiquette in war and human rights and whatever other bullshit makes 'em happy.

The truth is, any government that thinks war is somehow fair and subject to rules like a baseball game probably should not get into one.

I have only one piece of advice for what it's worth: if you don't want to get into a war where things go wrong, where the wrong people sometimes get killed, where innocent people sometimes have to die, then stay the hell out of it in the first place.

And he simply would not tolerate any other high-ranking officer, commissioned or noncommissioned, reaming out one of his guys. He

They're not their rules. They're our rules, the rules of the Western countries, the civilized side of the world. And every terrorist knows how to manipulate them in their own favor.

if you don't want to get into a war where things go wrong, where the wrong people sometimes get killed, where innocent people sometimes have to die, then stay the hell out of it in the first place.

In doing nothing men learn to do evil.

Do not expect good from another's death.

An orator is a good man who is skilled in speaking.

Okay. Life isn't like the movies—you know, how the bad guys just want to be bad guys, villains. In real life, there aren't very many villains. Mostly, people believe they're doing the right thing. Even the ones who are doing bad things usually believe they're heroes, that whatever terrible thing they're doing is to prevent something worse. They're scared.

The difference between a thug and a soldier, the guy had said, was the moral courage of his cause.

intentions and results. Cooper's intentions in killing Peters and releasing the video had been good; the results had been a disaster. Did that make his intentions wrong? If so, that meant morality was really only a way of talking about how we wished things were. Hope, empathy, idealism—maybe they didn't matter. Maybe the only

I'm OK with firing people when they fuck up, but canning them when they've done nothing wrong - that's painful. [on the layoffs needed after 9/11 hit the business]

We should never let our personal opinions screw up smart business choices.

Justice is the crowning glory of the virtues.

It is the act of a bad man to deceive by falsehood.

The first law for the historian is that he shall never dare utter an untruth. The second is that he shall suppress nothing that is true. Moreover, there shall be no suspicion of partiality in his writing, or of malice.

The foundation of justice is good faith.

There is wickedness in the intention of wickedness, even though it be not perpetrated in the act.

It might be pardonable to refuse to defend some men, but to defend them negligently is nothing short of criminal.

Virtue is a habit of the mind, consistent with nature and moderation and reason.

Laws are silent in time of war.

In time of war the laws are silent.

We should not be so taken up in the search for truth, as to neglect the needful duties of active life for it is only action that gives a true value and commendation to virtue.