Ethics and Morality

The hell to be endured hereafter, of which theology tells, is no worse than the hell we make for ourselves in this world by habitually fashioning our characters in the wrong way.

Every man feels instinctively that all the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.

An action is the perfection and publication of thought.

One person with a belief is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests.

All zeal for a reform that gives offense To peace and charity, is mere pretense.

If a man love the labor of any trade, apart from any question of success or fame, the gods have called him.

The beautiful word begets the beautiful deed.

All war is a symptom of man’s failure as a thinking animal.

We used to wonder where war lived, what it was that made it so vile. And now we realize that we know where it lives, that it is inside ourselves.

One advantage resulting from virtuous actions is that they elevate the mind and dispose it to attempt others more virtuous still.

Virtue would not go nearly so far if vanity did not keep her company.

He is ill clothed that is bare of virtue.

Virtue . . . is a mean state between two vices, the one of excess and the other of deficiency.

Sometimes Virtue starves, while Vice is fed.

There is never an instant’s truce between virtue and vice.

I prefer an accommodating vice to an obstinate virtue.

There are amiable vices and obnoxious virtues.

There are some faults so nearly allied to excellence that we can scarce weed out the vice without eradicating the virtue.

Some, either from being glued to vice by a natural attachment, or from long habit, no longer recognize its ugliness.

Astronomy was born of superstition; eloquence of ambition, hatred, falsehood, and flattery; geometry of avarice; physics of an idle curiosity; and even moral philosophy of human pride. Thus the arts and sciences owe their birth to our vices.

When our vices leave us, we flatter ourselves that we leave them.

Vice knows she’s ugly, so puts on her Mask.

and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.

So in the wicked there’s no vice Of which the saints have not a spice.