Quotes About Ethics

Die Ethik ist nur vollständig und echt und lebendig, wenn sie alle lebenden Wesen mit einschliesst.

Vernunft und Herz müssen miteinander wirken, wenn eine wahre Sittlichkeit zustande kommen soll.

Gutes tun will überlegt und gelernt sein.

Der unnatürliche Zustand, daß der Mensch nicht an eine von ihm selber erkannte Wahrheit glaubt, dauert an und wirkt sich aus. Die Stadt der Wahrheit kann nicht auf dem Sumpfboden des Skeptizismus erbaut werden.

By itself the affirmation of life can only produce a partial and imperfect civilization. Only if it turns inward and becomes ethical can the will to progress attain the ability to distinguish the valuable from the worthless. We must therefore strive for a civilization that is not based on the accretion of science and power alone, but which cares most of all for the spiritual and ethical development of the individual and of humankind. How

We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace.

A man does not have to be an angel to be a saint.

The thinking (person) must oppose all cruel customs, no matter how deeply rooted in tradition and surrounded by a halo. When we have a choice, we must avoid bringing torment and injury into the life of another.

being in a position to know and nevertheless shunning knowledge creates direct responsibility for the consequences...

For the commission to do a great building, I would have sold my soul like Faust. Now I had found my Mephistopheles. He seemed no less engaging than Goethe's.

Alguien puede estar mal, pero eso no implica hacer el mal.

Our ideals, laws and customs should be based on the proposition that each generation in turn becomes the custodian rather than the absolute owner of our resources - and each generation has the obligation to pass this inheritance on in the future.

Los hombres normales no eran buenos -siguió pensando- porque la normalidad se pagaba siempre, consciente o inconscientemente, a un precio muy caro y con una serie de complicidades varias, todas tan negativas; de insensibilidad, de estupidez, de vileza, cuando no derechamente de criminalidad

Young men go to war. Sometimes because they are have to, sometimes because they want to. Always, they feel they are supposed to. This comes from the sad, layered stories of life, which over the centuries have seen courage confused with picking up arms, and cowardice confused with laying them down.

A thing is right if it tends to preserve the stability, integrity, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong if it tends otherwise.

Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and aesthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.

That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics.

We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect. ~Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac

A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, the stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.

Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and aesthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient.

Individual thinkers since the days of Ezekiel and Isaiah have asserted that the despoliation of land is not only inexpedient but wrong. Society, however, has not yet affirmed their belief.

That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that land is to be loved and respected is an extension of ethics. That lands yields a cultural harvest is a fact long known, but latterly often forgotten.

All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts. His instincts prompt him to compete for his place in that community, but his ethics prompt him also to co-operate (perhaps in order that there may be a place to compete for). The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants, and animals, or collectively: the land.

The evolution of a land ethic is an intellectual as well as emotional process.