To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage, or of principle.

I do not recognize the right of the public to break in the front door of a man’s private life in order to satisfy the gaze of the curious… I do not think it right to dissect living men even for the advancement of science. So far as I am concerned, I prefer a post mortem examination to vivisection without anaesthetics.

What happened in the missile crisis in October 1962 has been prettified to make it look as if acts of courage and thoughtfulness abounded. The truth is that the whole episode was almost insane.

In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point.

Truth is certainly a branch of morality and a very important one to society.

I can hardly eat meat because it has to look like something what it was not when it was alive.

A man should be upright, not be kept upright.

I think most defense attorneys know, to some extent, their clients are guilty.

People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built.

It is more from carelessness about truth than from intentionally lying that there is so much falsehood in the world.

Example is leadership.

Forethought we may have, undoubtedly, but not foresight.

I never make conscious decisions.

People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything.

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.

Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself.

Abortion is clearly wrong.

He who does not prevent a crime when he can, encourages it.

I have not endorsed Trump and will not do so.

He incurs a fearful amount of guilt who in the least promotes the aim of the Evil One by trampling upon a tender conscience in a child.

Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worse kind of suffering.

What we won when all of our people united must not be lost in suspicion and distrust and selfishness and politics. Accordingly, I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as president.

When I was running training, we would fire a couple of leaders from every SEAL team because they couldn’t lead. And 99.9% of the time, it wasn’t a question of their ability – it was a question of their ability to listen.

Doctors will have more lives to answer for in the next world than even we generals.

I bought a gun and chose drugs instead.

One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.

Trust should be the basis for all our moral training.

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react.

Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment.

All philosophy lies in two words, sustain and abstain.

Just as courage is the danger of life, so is fear its safeguard.

Rights that do not flow from duty well performed are not worth having.

We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them.

If a person is successful, we imagine they are probably also ethical, conscientious and deserving of their good fortune. This obscures the fact that many people who get ahead have done so by doing less than moral actions, which they cleverly disguise from view.

Do you really think it is weakness that yields to temptation? I tell you that there are terrible temptations which it requires strength, strength and courage to yield to.

I worked in ad sales. I would call up local businesses and try to get them to buy ads in the paper. The whole time, I felt like I was just scamming people.

I think you have a moral responsibility when you’ve been given far more than you need, to do wise things with it and give intelligently.

In honorable dealing you should consider what you intended, not what you said or thought.

Successful and fortunate crime is called virtue.

The rise of capitalist practice and morality brought with it a radical revision of how the commons are treated, and also of how they are conceived.

Ordinary morality is innate in my view.

The precepts of the law are these: to live honestly, to injure no one, and to give everyone else his due.

Living at risk is jumping off the cliff and building your wings on the way down.

I didn’t want to submit to the army and then, on the day of judgment, have God say to me, ‚Why did you do that?‘ This life is a trial, and you realize that what you do is going to be written down for Judgment Day.

If you judge, investigate.

Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of considering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion.

A precedent embalms a principle.

Justice will overtake fabricators of lies and false witnesses.

I don’t think I would run for president.

If we do not maintain justice, justice will not maintain us.

I’m working on my life story. I’m not decided if it’s going to be a musical or a movie with music in it.

Justice… is a kind of compact not to harm or be harmed.

None but a coward dares to boast that he has never known fear.

He who fears being conquered is sure of defeat.

Violence is both unavoidable and unjustifiable.

Charity creates a multitude of sins.

It is a fine game to play – the game of politics – and it is well worth waiting for a good hand before really plunging.

It requires more courage to suffer than to die.

Any man can call time out, but no man can say how long the time out will be.

You sort of start thinking anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve.