Philosophy & Thought: Ethics & Morality Quotes

"Priests have to have the right to say that a sin is a sin"

Rocco Buttiglione, Politician

"A 1990 Gallup poll found that 77 percent of Americans polled said abortion was the taking of human life. I agree, and believe that taking the life on an innocent child is unjust"

Robert Casey, Politician

"A laugh, if purchased at the expense of propriety, costs too much"

Quintilian, Educator

"I hate it when people use sex as a weapon against the people who are engaging in it. It's so hypocritical"

Mira Sorvino, Actress

"Convinced that the attachment of colonies to the metropolis depends infinitely more upon moral and religious feeling than political arrangement, or even commercial advantage, I cannot but lament that more is not done to instill it into the minds of the people"

John Strachan, Clergyman

"Good government is the outcome of private virtue"

John Jay Chapman, Poet

"But, you know, sex is controversial, it just is and it always will be"

Liam Neeson, Actor

"Everyone spends their lives trying to balance their world between good and evil"

Laurell K. Hamilton, Writer

"America's state religion, is patriotism, a phenomenon which has convinced many of the citizenry that "treason" is morally worse than murder or rape"

William Blum, Author

"Anything as good and true as that moral cannot be new at this late date"

Richard H. Davis, Writer

"For your own good is a persuasive argument that will eventually make a man agree to his own destruction"

Janet Frame, Novelist

"It is almost impossible to imagine that any one could be so insensible to the high morality of Mr. Mill's character as to suggest to him any course of conduct that was not entirely upright and consistent"

Millicent Fawcett, Activist

"Love has its place, as does hate. Peace has its place, as does war. Mercy has its place, as do cruelty and revenge"

Meir Kahane, Clergyman

"I do not want to go into its physical reasons: the construction of the human body is different from that of carnivorous animals. But man's intelligence is such that it can be utilised to defend any-thing he does, whether right or wrong"

Morarji Desai, Politician

"Every life is a march from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or vice"

Lyman Abbott, Author

"I would, therefore, say that for no reason whatsoever, except in self-defence, should one think of killing any animal"

Morarji Desai, Politician

"From this it follows that con-sideration for other persons or for other living beings is very vital for goodness and want of consideration for other people makes human beings selfish, regardless for other people's good"

Morarji Desai, Politician

"There is more criticism of Puritanism, and more distance from Christian morality, than there has been before"

Susie Bright, Writer

"This idea of selfishness as a virtue, as opposed to generosity: That, to me, is unnatural"

Jessica Lange, Actress

"Basically, we are a whole world of people desperately trying to figure out what is the dark side of our natures and how much can we explore without becoming something else"

William Petersen, Actor

"We need a tougher enforcement program and, most importantly, we need to fix the badly broken ethics system"

Marty Meehan, Politician

"If I practised sex, out of moral conviction, that was one thing; but to enjoy it... seemed a defeat"

Martha Gellhorn, Journalist

"I will never have a drink and get behind the wheel of a car. It's not illegal to drink and drive, but there becomes a certain point where it does become a crime"

Tracey Gold, Actress

"If you didn't have any conscious beings in the world, there really wouldn't be morality, but with consciousness that you have it"

Roger Penrose, Physicist

"I'm always suspicious of people who repent of other people's sins"

Jean-Marie Le Pen, Politician

"The Jewish nation is indeed, the heart of the world, and there is no reason for the existence of empires, kings, rulers, masses or systems aside from their reaction to the Jewish people"

Meir Kahane, Clergyman

"So I think what you see in this show is, it's really not a just world at all, but you get what you give. So in terms of world view, I would say that's where the differences lie"

Andre Braugher, Actor

"We all love the environment, but we have placed creatures above people. A rat is a rat"

Sonny Bono, Musician

"Because everything we say and do is the length and shadow of our own souls, our influence is determined by the quality of our being"

Dale Turner, Writer

"To address questions of scientific responsibility does not necessarily imply that one needs technical competence in a particular field (e.g., biology) to evaluate certain technical matters"

Serge Lang, Mathematician

"Everywhere I go, I see increasing evidence of people swirling about in a human cesspit of their own making"

Norman Angell, Writer

"If absolute power corrupts absolutely, does absolute powerlessness make you pure?"

Harry Shearer, Actor

"It graduates to 'our state is better than your state,' and 'our nation is better than your nation.' And it circles all the way around to where it started: 'Our God is better than your God.'"

Neale Donald Walsch, Author

"Every life is march from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or vice"

Lyman Abbott, Author

"Sometimes the way you respond to horrific, evil deeds is the measure of one's self as a man, as a nation, as people, as a community"

James Woods, Actor

"I believe there is a moral sense and a global ethic that commands attention from people of every religion and every faith, and people of no faith. But I think what's new is that we now have the capacity to communicate instantaneously across frontiers right across the world"

Gordon Brown, Politician

"But I think it is a serious issue to wonder about the other platonic absolutes of, say, beauty and morality"

Roger Penrose, Physicist

"Basically, the reason I'm vegan is because when I was about 16 or 17 years old, I began to understand that we don't need to contribute to the killing and exploitation of animals to feed our bodies correctly"

Daniel Johns, Musician

"As for morality, well, that's all tied up with the question of consciousness"

Roger Penrose, Physicist

"Everyone's values are defined by what they will tolerate when it is done to others"

William Greider, Author

Page 62 of 78