Philosophy & Thought: Ethics & Morality Quotes

"The kind of society which we still have is maybe, in some cases, getting worse. Competition is becoming a virtue. Intense competition drives people to go more and more into self-interest. Even to see other folks as competition"

Major Owens, Politician

"One needs to know what the hierarchy of values are from which one takes inspiration, and in a democratic society this is the subject of continuous democratic debate"

Rocco Buttiglione, Politician

"I support non-discrimination for homosexuals, but I think, or at least I have the right to think - without saying whether I think it or not - I have the right to think, along with the Catechism of the Catholic Church, that homosexuality is morally wrong"

Rocco Buttiglione, Politician

"Democrats always like to brag that their guys are smarter than the opponents and Republicans always like to brag that their guys are more moral than the opponents. But if you're looking for morals in politics you're looking for bananas in the cheese department"

Harry Shearer, Actor

"Though large herds of deer do much harm to the neighbourhood, yet the injury to the morals of the people is of more moment than the loss of their crops"

Gilbert White, Scientist

"In every aspect of life, including the economic dimension, we are always challenged to do the right thing. In many cases in the market system, which allows a great deal of latitude for human choice, people can get carried away to excess"

Lee R. Raymond, Businessman

"We approach people the same way we approach our cars. We take the poor kid to a doctor and ask, What's wrong with him, how much will it cost, and when can I pick him up?"

James Hillman, Psychologist

"To have guilt you've got to earn guilt, but sometimes when you earn it, you don't feel the guilt you ought to have. And that's what The Firebombing is about"

James Dickey, Novelist

"Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues"

Quintilian, Educator

"Any political agenda and organization which doesn't begin with personal responsibility is just half the argument. It's just not going to succeed"

Peter Coyote, Actor

"And as the hour approached for the execution, in his own mind, Collins became both the executioner and the victim. He would pace up and down, transformed in almost a kind of exorcism when he knew he was responsible for taking someone's life"

Liam Neeson, Actor

"The minister of the Gospel is really the yardstick by which the nation measures its morals"

Jimmy Swaggart, Clergyman

"If we win, someone else loses. But if someone else loses, we lose. Which is a point we're not getting. The new spirituality will make this just painfully obvious"

Neale Donald Walsch, Author

"We should propagate the values of vegetarianism"

Morarji Desai, Politician

"But as we shall see, Roosevelt, through a combination of events and influences, fell deeper and deeper into the toils of various revolutionary operators, not because he was interested in revolution but because he was interested in votes"

John T. Flynn, Critic

"My idea of what's good and bad and right and wrong is maybe greyer than most, and I like writing about that"

Shaun Cassidy, Musician

"Given the way some fought for the status quo when I authored the new Ethics Code and created the city's first Ethics Commission, we are going to need your strong support to get an even tougher Ethics Code passed this year"

Laura Miller, Politician

"I think it is obscene that we should believe that we are entitled to end somebody's life, no matter what that person has supposedly done or not done"

Richard Attenborough, Actor

"Our awesome responsibility to ourselves, to our children, and to the future is to create ourselves in the image of goodness, because the future depends on the nobility of our imaginings"

Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, Writer

"Brutality to an animal is cruelty to mankind - it is only the difference in the victim"

Alphonse de Lamartine, Poet

"I think we're miserable partly because we have only one god, and that's economics"

James Hillman, Psychologist

"We create monsters and then we can't control them"

Joel Coen, Director

"If venereal delight and the power of propagating the species were permitted only to the virtuous, it would make the world very good"

James Boswell, Lawyer

"Every man may reign secure in his petty tyranny, and spread terror and desolation around him, until the trump of the Archangel shall excite different emotions in his soul"

James Otis, Lawyer

"If you build that foundation, both the moral and the ethical foundation, as well as the business foundation, and the experience foundation, then the building won't crumble"

Henry Kravis, Businessman

"Virtue looks good, but it only suits imposing figures"

Frank Wedekind, Playwright

"It goes without saying that the desire to accomplish the task with more confidence, to avoid wasting time and labour, and to spare our experimental animals as much as possible, made us strictly observe all the precautions taken by surgeons in respect to their patients"

Ivan Pavlov, Psychologist

"I'm always active in trying to educate people when it comes to eating animal products, testing on animals, and the health benefits of being vegan, although I'm probably not the best person to be talking about the latter at the moment"

Daniel Johns, Musician

"I do think you feel a little bit like you are preying on people's lives"

Emily Watson, Actress

"In early January I introduced my legislation, which, besides prohibiting Federal funding of human cloning, also expresses the sense of Congress that foreign nations should establish total prohibition on human cloning as well"

Cliff Stearns, Politician

"Human beings exercise responsibilities within a social setting and a framework of obligations which transcend the principle of intelligence"

Michael Polanyi, Scientist

"Duty largely consists of pretending that the trivial is critical"

John Fowles, Writer

"If all human lives depended upon their usefulness - as might be judged by certain standards - there would be a sudden and terrific mortality in the world"

Gene Tunney, Athlete

"To say of shame - what is it? Of virtue - we can miss it; Of sin-we can kiss it, And it's no longer sin"

Algernon Charles Swinburne, Poet

"People who attack others need rationalizations for doing so. We undermine those rationalizations"

Barbara Deming, Author

"A street thug and a paid killer are professionals - beasts of prey, if you will, who have dissociated themselves from the rest of humanity and can now see human beings in the same way that trout fishermen see trout"

Willard Gaylin, Scientist

"What is good for Germany is right, and everything that harms Germany is wrong"

Robert Ley, Soldier

"The true grandeur of humanity is in moral elevation, sustained, enlightened and decorated by the intellect of man"

Charles Sumner, Politician

"Selfishness is the only real atheism; unselfishness the only real religion"

Israel Zangwill, Novelist

"Style is not neutral; it gives moral directions"

Martin Amis, Author

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