Ethics

"It means, people who are in high and responsible positions, if they go against righteousness, righteousness itself will get transformed into a destroyer."

"When all is said and done, the greatest satisfaction you'll have in this life as you grow old will be seeing your children grow in righteousness and faith and goodness as citizens of the society of which they are a part."

"The company of just and righteous men is better than wealth and a rich estate."

"True religion is real living; living with all one's soul, with all one's goodness and righteousness."

"There are two sorts of hypocrites: one that are deceived with their outward morality and external religion; many of which are professed Arminians, in the doctrine of justification: and the other, are those that are deceived with false discoveries and elevations; which often cry down works, and men's own righteousness, and talk much of free grace; but at the same time make a righteousness of their discoveries, and of their humiliation, and exalt themselves to heaven with them. These two kinds of hypocrites, Mr. Shepard, in his Exposition of the Parable of the Ten Virgins, distinguishes by the names of legal and evangelical hypocrites; and often speaks of the latter as the worst. And it is evident that the latter are commonly by far the most confident in their hope, and with the most difficulty brought off from it: I have scarcely known the instance of such a one, in my life, that has been undeceived."

"Some cultural anthropologists posit that Westerners do the right thing to avoid feeling guilty, and Asians do the right thing to avoid feeling shame. If correct, it would explain the deeply ingrained aversion to a loss of face among Chinese people, as shame, unlike guilt, implies the public knows about the act."

"The Superior Man is aware of Righteousness, the inferior man is aware of advantage."

"But seek till ye find, and, whatever ye find for the present, let your last act be to lay and leave yourselves on the righteousness of His Son, expecting life through His name, according to the promise of the Father."

"Now, the redemption which we as yet await (continued Imlac), will be that of Kalki, who will come as a Silver Stallion: all evils and every sort of folly will perish at the coming of this Kalki: true righteousness will be restored, and the minds of men will be made as clear as crystal."

"One of the trials of life is that we do not usually receive immediately the full blessing for righteousness or the full cursing for wickedness."

"A home with a loving and loyal husband and wife is the supreme setting in which children can be reared in love and righteousness and in which the spiritual and physical needs of children can be met."

"Righteousness and faith certainly are instrumental in healing the sick, deaf, or lame — if such healing accomplishes God's purposes and is in accordance with His will. Thus, even with strong faith, many mountains will not be moved. And not all of the sick and infirm will be healed."

"RIGHTEOUSNESS, n. A sturdy virtue that was once found among the Pantidoodles inhabiting the lower part of the peninsula of Oque. Some feeble attempts were made by returned missionaries to introduce it into several European countries, but it appears to have been imperfectly expounded."

"Whenever righteousness wanes and unrighteousness increases I send myself forth. For the protection of the good and for the destruction of evil, and for the establishment of righteousness, I come into being age after age."

"All men have a feeling, that they would rather you told them a civil lie than give them a point blank refusal…. If you make a promise, the thing is still uncertain, depends on a future day, and concerns but few people; but if you refuse you alienate people to a certainty and at once, and many people too."

"Promises must be kept and contracts strictly observed to the extent that the commitments made in them are morally just. A significant part of economic and social life depends on the honoring of contracts between physical or moral persons - commercial contracts of purchase or sale, rental or labor contracts. All contracts must be agreed to and executed in good faith. Contracts are subject to commutative justice which regulates exchanges between persons and between institutions in accordance with a strict respect for their rights. Commutative justice obliges strictly; it requires safeguarding property rights, paying debts, and fulfilling obligations freely contracted. Without commutative justice, no other form of justice is possible."

"There buds the promise of celestial worth."

"We promise according to our hopes, and perform according to our fears."

"You never bade me hope, 'tis true; I asked you not to swear: But I looked in those eyes of blue, And read a promise there."

"Promettre c'est donner, espérer c'est jouir."

"Promise is most given when the least is said."

"Promises and Pye-Crusts,… are made to be broken."

"His promises were, as he then was, mighty; But his performance, as he is now, nothing."

"And be these juggling fiends no more believ'd, That palter with us in a double sense: That keep the word of promise to our ear, And break it to our hope."

"Thy promises are like Adonis' gardens That one day bloomed and fruitful were the next."

"The Great Spirit placed me and my people on this land poor and naked. When the white men came we gave them lands, and did not wish to hurt them. But the white man drove us back and took our lands. Then the Great Father [president] made us many promises, but they are not kept. He promised to give us large presents, and when they came to us they were small; they seemed to be lost on the way."

"Giants in Their promises, but those obtained, weak pigmies In their performance."

"We must not promise what we ought not, lest we be called on to perform what we cannot."

"[P]eople, act upon motives. Why should they do any thing for us, if we will do nothing for them? If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the strongest motive---even the promise of freedom. And the promise being made, must be kept."

"A man who had two sons ... went to the first and said, "Son, go out and work in my vineyard today." But he answered and said, "I will not," but afterward he repented of it and he went. And the father went to the second and said the same. But he answered, "I will, sir," and he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?"

"The Ninth Rule of the ethics of means and ends is that any effective means is automatically judged by the opposition as being unethical."

"This concept of "national defense" cannot be deemed an end in itself, justifying any exercise of legislative power designed to promote such a goal."

"A means can be justified only by its end. But the end in its turn needs to be justified."

"Often it is means that justify ends: Goals advance technique and technique survives even when goal structures crumble."

"Exitus acta probat."

"There are means people and there are ends people. The means people create distinctions among means and call it morality. The ends people understand that in this world, in this system we're born into, anything that gets you what you want is a good thing."

"If the end doesn't justify the means, what does?"

"That the morality of actions depends on the consequences which they tend to produce, is the doctrine of rational persons of all schools; that the good or evil of those consequences is measured solely by pleasure or pain, is all of the doctrine of the school of utility, which is peculiar to it."

"An agent who regarded [sound moral principles] as mere rules of thumb would ignore them whenever she calculated that compliance wasn’t necessary to minimize the cumulative badness of suffering. The problem is that it might also be in her own interest to violate these principles, and self-interest could distort her calculations, even when she calculated sincerely. She could thus acquire a pattern of violating the principles even when compliance with them really was necessary to prevent the worst cumulative suffering. To avoid this, we would want her to feel strongly inhibited from violating the principles. Inhibitions of this kind can insulate agents from the effect of biased calculations."

"As my poor d'Artagnan used to swear, the importance of the end justifies the meanness of the methods."

"I can imagine no man who will look with more horror on the End than a conscientious revolutionary who has, in a sense sincerely, been justifying cruelties and injustices inflicted on millions of his contemporaries by the benefits which he hopes to confer on future generations."

"The end justifies the means. But what if there never is an end? All we have is means."

"... had I taken the line, so often adopted by strong men in controversy, of justifying the means by the result."

"Given the means, we hang on to them and often forget the ends."

"Consequentialism says that consequences—"results," as a pragmatist might say—are the only things that ultimately matter. Here the word "ultimately" is very important. It's not that things other than consequences—things like being honest, for example—don't matter, but rather that other things matter, when they do, because of their consequences. According to consequentialism, our ultimate goal should be to make things go as well as possible."

"He who chooses the beginning of a road chooses the place it leads to. It is the means that determine the end."

"Perfection of means and confusion of goals seem, in my opinion, to characterize our age."

"The means, it is said, will be justified by the end; but it is the means which define it, and if it is contradicted at the moment that it is set up, the whole enterprise sinks into absurdity."

"Does the end justify the means? That is possible. But what will justify the end? To that question, which historical thought leaves pending, rebellion replies: the means."

"A man wants to earn money in order to be happy, and his whole effort and the best of a life are devoted to the earning of that money. Happiness is forgotten; the means are taken for the end."