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Quotes about morality

501 quotes from 241 people

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People are unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered. Love them anyway. If you do good, people may accuse you of selfish motives. Do good anyway. If you are successful, you may win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Honesty and transparency make you vulnerable. Be honest and transparent anyway. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. People who really want help may attack you if you help them. Help them anyway. Give the world the best you have and you may get hurt. Give the world your best anyway.
Mother Teresa1910–1997
If you judge people, you have no time to love them.
Mother Teresa1910–1997
- Love
If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
Mother Teresa1910–1997
“Revenge may be wicked, but it’s natural,” answered Miss Rebecca. “I’m no angel.”
William Makepeace Thackeray1811–1863Vanity Fair (1848), Chapter IIIn context
- Good & Evil
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Walden (1854), p. 87In context
- Good & Evil
Why has every man a conscience, then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward.
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Civil Disobedience (1849)In context
- Government
All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with a slight moral tinge to it, a playing with right and wrong, with moral questions; and betting naturally accompanies it.
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Civil Disobedience (1849)In context
- Voting
The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior. What demon possessed me that I behaved so well?
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Walden (1854), Economy (1 of 3)In context
- Virtue
Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience, then?
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Civil Disobedience (1849)In context
- Laws
It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume, is to do at any time what I think right.
Henry David Thoreau1817–1862Civil Disobedience (1849)In context
- Laws
Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith.
Alexis de Tocqueville1805–1859
- Faith
- Liberty
Nothing is quite so wretchedly corrupt as an aristocracy which has lost its power but kept its wealth and which still has endless leisure to devote to nothing but banal enjoyments. All its great thoughts and passionate energy are things of the past, and nothing but a host of petty, gnawing vices now cling to it like worms to a corpse.
Alexis de Tocqueville1805–1859Democracy in America, Volume II (1840), Book Three, Chapter XI.
- Money
He was as great as a man can be without morality.
Alexis de Tocqueville1805–1859Said of Napoleon (1842), “Discours de réception a L’Académie Française prononcé le 21 Avril 1842” Oeuvres complètes, vol. IX, p. 17
A man can live and be healthy without killing animals for food; therefore, if he eats meat, he participates in taking animal life merely for the sake of his appetite. And to act so is immoral.
Leo Tolstoy1828–1910Writings on Civil Disobedience and Nonviolence (1886)
- Animals
- Food
It is often better for a person to recognize a sin than to do a good deed. Recognizing a sin makes a person humble. Doing a good deed often can feed a person’s pride.
Leo Tolstoy1828–1910Path of Life (1909), p. 108
- Pride