When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.

He who commits injustice is ever made more wretched than he who suffers it.

Money, not morality, is the principle commerce of civilized nations.

Don’t create more enemies than you take out by some immoral act.

If men were born free, they would, so long as they remained free, form no conception of good and evil.

To assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today.

I know of nothing more despicable and pathetic than a man who devotes all the hours of the waking day to the making of money for money’s sake.

What can I know? What ought I to do? What can I hope?

A moral monopoly is the antithesis of a marketplace of ideas.

Hatred is gained as much by good works as by evil.

Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax.

As we know, while our species remains alive, everybody has the sacred duty to be optimistic. Ethically, any other behaviour wouldn’t be admissible.

Courtesy is as much a mark of a gentleman as courage.

There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right.

Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.

The most important of all revolutions, a revolution in sentiments, manners and moral opinions.

Force always attracts men of low morality.

Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.

Well, I thought the deal was, when you went to work for the government you weren’t supposed to make money!

Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time.

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.

Conscience is the inner voice that warns us that someone might be looking.

For a war to be just three conditions are necessary – public authority, just cause, right motive.

About morals, I know only that what is moral is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.

Sin, also for those who don’t have faith, exists when one goes against one’s conscience. To listen to and obey it means, in fact, to decide in face of what is perceived as good or evil. And on this decision pivots the goodness or malice of our action.

To terrify children with the image of hell… to consider women an inferior creation. Is that good for the world?

Our character is what we do when we think no one is looking.

Morality is the herd-instinct in the individual.

Sometimes we look at gay being a bigger sin than being proud or not telling the truth. I don’t think God categorizes sins.

Ordinary morality is innate in my view.

Virtue is relative to the actions and ages of each of us in all that we do.

On some positions, Cowardice asks the question, ‚Is it safe?‘ Expediency asks the question, ‚Is it politic?‘ And Vanity comes along and asks the question, ‚Is it popular?‘ But Conscience asks the question, ‚Is it right?‘

You’re morally tainted if you don’t treat both the accuser and the accused with fairness and with respect, and with due process.

The function of wisdom is to discriminate between good and evil.

The test of a man or woman’s breeding is how they behave in a quarrel.

No weapon has ever settled a moral problem. It can impose a solution but it cannot guarantee it to be a just one.

Those who commit injustice bear the greatest burden.

Doing well is the result of doing good. That’s what capitalism is all about.

All the commandments: You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, and so on, are summed up in this single command: You must love your neighbor as yourself.

He has committed the crime who profits by it.

Act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

It is as hard and severe a thing to be a true politician as to be truly moral.

You cannot be in a position of power and destroy the life of another person.

Honor is the reward of virtue.

Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.

Effective action is always unjust.

False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.

The number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the state.

I have to live for others and not for myself: that’s middle-class morality.

I think where political issues invade moral situations, spiritual leaders have to speak out.

I think big business is a terrible thing for the spirit of the country, as our spirit is the best thing about us.

Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws.

So long as governments set the example of killing their enemies, private individuals will occasionally kill theirs.

To be safe at the expense of the liberty of other people is a difficult equation.

Advertising is a racket, like the movies and the brokerage business. You cannot be honest without admitting that its constructive contribution to humanity is exactly minus zero.

The time has come for all evangelists to practice full financial disclosure. The world is watching how we walk and how we talk. We must have the highest standards of morality, ethics and integrity if we are to continue to have influence.

Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so.

The first step in the evolution of ethics is a sense of solidarity with other human beings.

I am afraid we must make the world honest before we can honestly say to our children that honesty is the best policy.

You cannot mix sports with politics.

Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire, called conscience.