No man is justified in doing evil on the ground of expedience.

One of the great attractions of patriotism – it fulfills our worst wishes. In the person of our nation we are able, vicariously, to bully and cheat. Bully and cheat, what’s more, with a feeling that we are profoundly virtuous.

We just seem to have lost all our morals and principles and values these days.

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

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

For my part, I desire to see the time when education – and by its means, morality, sobriety, enterprise and industry – shall become much more general than at present, and should be gratified to have it in my power to contribute something to the advancement of any measure which might have a tendency to accelerate the happy period.

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 it is right.

We’ve become, now, an oligarchy instead of a democracy. I think that’s been the worst damage to the basic moral and ethical standards to the American political system that I’ve ever seen in my life.

There is still much debate about whether torture has been effective in eliciting information – the assumption being, apparently, that if it is effective, then it may be justified.

An explanation of cause is not a justification by reason.

Each of us has a vision of good and of evil. We have to encourage people to move towards what they think is good… Everyone has his own idea of good and evil and must choose to follow the good and fight evil as he conceives them. That would be enough to make the world a better place.

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

Those who have virtue always in their mouths, and neglect it in practice, are like a harp, which emits a sound pleasing to others, while itself is insensible of the music.

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

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

Abortion isn’t a lesser evil, it’s a crime. Taking one life to save another, that’s what the Mafia does. It’s a crime. It’s an absolute evil.

In my view, the only thing worse than a rock star is a rock star with a conscience.

Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.

How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense, and love the offender, yet detest the offence?

Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.

In a certain sense the Good is comfortless.

There is no reason why good cannot triumph as often as evil. The triumph of anything is a matter of organization. If there are such things as angels, I hope that they are organized along the lines of the Mafia.

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

You cannot make a sinner into a saint by killing him. He who does not live as a saint here will never live as a saint hereafter.

Morality is simply the attitude we adopt towards people whom we personally dislike.

The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one really inflexible point of honor.

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

Some like to think that a keen appreciation of art can actually make us better people – more just, more moral, more sensitive, more understanding. Perhaps that is true – in certain rare, isolated cases.

Fear is the mother of morality.

Character is always known. Thefts never enrich; alms never impoverish; murder will speak out of stone walls.

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

Conscience is a mother-in-law whose visit never ends.

Don’t lie about anything, ever. Lying leads to Hell.

I know many books which have bored their readers, but I know of none which has done real evil.

If there is no God, everything is permitted.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

Faced with what is right, to leave it undone shows a lack of courage.

Ethics is in origin the art of recommending to others the sacrifices required for cooperation with oneself.

We need to have business leaders who live by deep, strong principles.

I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.

The wave of evil washes all our institutions alike.

A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business.

Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved.

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

The mediation by the serpent was necessary. Evil can seduce man, but cannot become man.

It is better to risk saving a guilty man than to condemn an innocent one.

In matters of truth and justice, there is no difference between large and small problems, for issues concerning the treatment of people are all the same.

At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.

The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedience, and by parts.

The computer brings out the worst in some people.

Morality is a private and costly luxury.

Lawless are they that make their wills their law.

It is better to take what does not belong to you than to let it lie around neglected.

If co-operation is a duty, I hold that non-co-operation also under certain conditions is equally a duty.

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.

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

To see and listen to the wicked is already the beginning of wickedness.

Knowledge becomes evil if the aim be not virtuous.

For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?

Integrity has no need of rules.