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Quotes about morality

501 quotes from 241 people

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It is a mistake always to contemplate the good and ignore the evil, because by making people neglectful it lets in disaster. There is a dangerous optimism of ignorance and indifference.
Helen Keller1880–1968Optimism (1903)
- Good & Evil
A man does what he must, in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures, and that is the basis of all human morality.
John F. Kennedy1917–1963Profiles in Courage (1956), 1964 Memorial Edition, p. 266
Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in a period of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.
John F. Kennedy1917–1963At the signing of a charter establishing the German Peace Corps, Bonn, West Germany (24 June 1963)
We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others.
Robert F. Kennedy1925–1968On the Mindless Menace of Violence (1968)
- Charity
When the accumulation of wealth is no longer of high social importance, there will be great changes in the code of morals.
John Maynard Keynes1883–1946“Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren”, The Nation and Athenaeum (October 1930)
- Money
A harvest is made honorable when it sustains the giver as well as the taker.
Robin Wall Kimmererborn 1953Braiding Sweetgrass (2013), p. 194
- Nature
Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’ Expediency asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’ Vanity asks the question, ‘Is it popular?’ But, conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’ And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one’s conscience tells one that it is right.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–19681968 version
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968Strength to Love, Chapter 7
- Science
I am not interested in power for power’s sake, but I’m interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968
We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963)
The time is always right to do what’s right.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968“The Future of Integration”, address in Finney Chapel at Oberlin College (22 October 1964), as quoted in “When MLK came to Oberlin” by Cindy Leise, The Chronicle-Telegram (21 January 2008)
Some things are right and some things are wrong, no matter if everybody is doing the contrary.
Martin Luther King Jr.1929–1968Rediscovering Lost Values (1954)
It’s better to be good than evil, but one achieves goodness at a terrific cost.
Stephen Kingborn 1947
- Good & Evil
One single war — we all know — may be productive of more evil, immediate and subsequent, than hundreds of years of the unchecked action of the mutual-aid principle may be productive of good.
Peter Kropotkin1842–1921Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902)
- Good & Evil
- War & Peace
True human goodness, in all its purity and freedom, can come to the fore only when its recipient has no power.
Milan Kundera1929–2023The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), Pt. 7, ch. 2
- Power