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Ethics Quotes
"Just as you can never squeeze water out of the water, you can never squeeze the good out of goodness: You simply tap into the good by positioning yourself and allowing it."
62
"The meaning of man's existence is not to dominate over others, but to better humanity."
62
"People turned against each other cannot turn against those responsible."
61
"Admiration provides no saving grace for the inconvenient."
61
"So much attention is paid to the aggressive sins, such as violence and cruelty, and greed with all their tragic effects, that too little attention is paid to the passive sins, such as apathy and laziness, which in the long run can have a more devastating and destructive effect upon society than the others."
61
"The scrupulous survivors in life are the best counterweight to unscrupulous survivors."
60
"Cannibals? Who is not a cannibal? I tell you it will be more tolerable for the Fejee that salted down a lean missionary in his cellar against a coming famine; it will be more tolerable for that provident Fejee, I say, in the day of judgement, than for thee, civilized and enlightened gourmand, who nailest geese to the ground and feastest on their bloated livers in thy pate de fois gras."
60
"We understand and recognize what is good, but we do not labor to bring it to fulfillment, some of us out of laziness, some because we put something else, some pleasure, before virtue--and there are many pleasures in life, long conversations and indolence-that pleasing vice.."
59
"It speaks volumes when people who are discriminated against go on to discriminate against others."
59
"We despise and abhor the bully, the brawler, the oppressor, whether in private or public life, but we despise no less the coward and the voluptuary. No man is worth calling a man who will not fight rather than submit to infamy or see those that are dear to him suffer wrong."
59
"If we accept being talked to any kind of a way, then we are telling ourselves we are not quite worth the best. And if we have the effrontery to talk to anybody with less than courtesy, we tell ourselves and the world we are not very intelligent."
58
"Perhaps in the back of our minds we already understand, without all the science I've discussed, that something terribly wrong is happening. Our sustenance now comes from misery. We know that if someone offers to show us a film on how our meat is produced, it will be a horror film. We perhaps know more than we care to admit, keeping it down in the dark places of our memory-- disavowed. When we eat factory-farmed meat we live, literally, on tortured flesh. Increasingly, that tortured flesh is becoming our own."
58
"The Master said, "If your conduct is determined solely by considerations of profit you will arouse great resentment."
58
"If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be content to take their own and depart."
57
"In order for you to receive, someone else has to give. That's called sacrifice."
57
"It reveals how well you value someone - the way you handle their belongings."
57
"The wicked fear the good, because the good are a constant reproach to their consciences. The ungodly like religion in the same way that they like lions, either dead or behind bars; they fear religion when it breaks loose and begins to challenge their consciences."
57
"The virtue of a man ought to be measured not by his extraordinary exertions, but by his every-day conduct."
56
"Knowledge has a great power. Therefore, unethical use of knowledge can be extremely harmful."
56
"Now this was one of the things I had been brought up to eschew like disgrace; it being held by my father neither the part of a Christian nor yet of a gentleman to set his own livelihood and fish for that of others, on the cast of painted pasteboard."
56
"The major abscess in the mind is a lack of acknowledgement of evil."
56
"Moral' means one is free to enjoy only the things that belong to him and those he receives naturally and spontaneously. That is the ultimate meaning of morality."
56
"It is generally, in the season of prosperity that men discover their real temper, principles and design."
55
"It is justice and respect that I want the world to dust off and put - without delay, and with tenderness - back on the head of the Palestinian child. It will be imperfect justice and respect because the injustice and disrespect have been so severe. But I believe we are right to try."
55
"We see things like reciprocity which are fairly central to our view of ethics. But if you're talking about a set of worked-out rules on what we are supposed to do then, yes, it is a human product."
55
"The choices we make in life are equally important to us, as those of others are to them. It is an arrogant attitude in the mind of those who feel superior to believe their choices are better than others. Having respect for others regardless of who they are is the greatest choice anyone can make."
54
"It's hard luck always having to be a judge."
54
"Just how common do such savageries have to be for a decent person to be unable to overlook them? If you knew that one in one thousand food animals suffered actions like those described above, would you continue to eat animals? One in one hundred? One in ten?"
54
"Ignorance is no reason with a fool for holding his tongue."
54
"Each one of us is responsible for reducing the negative potential of every situation we have to face."
53
"Man's life is the standard of morality, but your own life is its purpose . If existence on earth is your goal, you must choose your actions and values by the standard of that which is proper to man-for the purpose of preserving, fulfilling and enjoying the irreplaceable value which is your life."
53
"Over time, your actions betray your heart - for good or for evil."
53
"Reason 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."
53
"Be humble: have the courage to speak the truth."
53
"Our response to the factory farm is ultimately a test of how we respond to the powerless, to the most distant, to the voiceless - it is a test of how we act when no one is forcing us to act one way or another. Consistency is not required, but engagement with the problem is."
53
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