Virtue Quotes - Page 3

The intelligent are candles,the virtuous are torches,the wise are lamps,and the enlightened are stars.

Our genuine happiness comes from doing things we feel good about, not from doing things that make us feel good.

You become greater than what you conquer within.

The human self also has a nature, limits as well as potentials. If you seek vocation without understanding the material you are working with, what you build with your life will be ungainly and may well put lives in peril, your own and some of those around you. 'Faking it' in the service of high values is no virtue and has nothing to do with vocation. It is an ignorant, sometimes arrogant, attempt to override one's nature, and it will always fail.

The real strength of a man is not in the size of his muscles, but in the size of his heart.

Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action. If an organism fails in that action, it dies...It is only the concept of ‘Life’ that makes the concept of 'Value’ possible. It is only to a living entity that things can be good or evil.

Feeling important is a vice, not a virtue, however concealed as participation in something noble.

It be urged that the wild and uncultivated tree, hitherto yielding sour and bitter fruit only, can never be made to yield better; yet we know that the grafting art implants a new tree on the savage stock, producing what is most estimable in kind and degree. Education, in like manner, engrafts a new man on the native stock, and improves what in his nature was vicious and perverse into qualities of virtue and social worth.

the evil that is in this world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. On the whole, men are more good than bad; that however isn't the real point. But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue;

So may the outward shows be least themselves:The world is still deceived with ornament.In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,Obscures the show of evil? In religion,What damned error, but some sober browWill bless it and approve it with a text,Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?There is no vice so simple but assumesSome mark of virtue on his outward parts.

Love your friends with your eyes closed, but love your enemies with both eyes open.

He never complained. He seemed to have no instinct for the making much of oneself that complaining requires.

It's easy to run to others. It's so hard to stand on one's own record. You can fake virtue for an audience. You can't fake it in your own eyes. Your ego is your strictest judge. They run from it. They spend their lives running. It's easier to donate a few thousand to charity and think oneself noble than to base self-respect on personal standards of personal achievement. It's simple to seek substitutes for competence--such easy substitutes: love, charm, kindness, charity. But there is no substitute for competence.

Virtue makes for a cold bed.

You know Mildred would never do anything wrong or foolish. I reflected a little sadly that this was only too true and hoped I did not appear too much that kind of person to others. Virtue is an excellent thing and we should all strive after it, but it can sometimes be a little depressing.

Virtue is like a rich stone best plain set.

If you asked twenty good men to-day what they thought the highest of the virtues, nineteen of them would reply, Unselfishness. But if you asked almost any of the great Christians of old he would have replied, Love - You see what has happened? A negative term has been substituted for a positive, and this is of more than philological importance. The negative ideal of Unselfishness carries with it the suggestion not primarily of securing good things for others, but of going without them ourselves, as if our abstinence and not their happiness was the important point.

Suffering — how divine it is, how misunderstood! We owe to it all that is good in us, all that gives value to life; we owe to it pity, we owe to it courage, we owe to it all the virtues.

What virtue is there in a man who demonstrates goodness because he has been bred to it? It is his habit from youth. But a man who has known unkindness and want, for him to be kind and charitable to those who have been the cause of his misfortunes, that is a virtuous man.

Idleness is the beginning of all vice, the crown of all virtues.

Falsehood of a good man is better than truth of a bad one.

Pride has often been his best friend. It has connected him nearer with virtue than any other feeling.

If a man has no vices he's in great danger of making vices about his virtues and there's a spectacle.

A beautiful face cannot hide an ugly heart for long.

self-preservation is the primary and only foundation of virtue.

Just as meekness is in all our virtues, so is pride in all our sins. -Oct 1986

There is a kind of virtue that lies not in extraordinary actions, not in saving poor orphans from burning buildings, but in steadfastly working for a world where orphans are not poor and buildings comply with decent fire codes.

What every man should desire is an ugly woman with a beautiful heart, not a beautiful woman with an ugly heart.

It is better to lose friends than to lose your reputation, and better to lose riches than to lose your integrity.

Everything we do in life reflects through the virtues of a nation. For example if a nation is ruled through Fear, the Manifestation of War rises; If a nation is ruled through Love, War would not exist and Harmony would find its way.

A woman’s beauty is worth little to you, a woman’s intelligence is worth much to you, a woman’s virtue is worth more to you, a woman’s love is worth the most to you, and a woman’s loyalty is worth everything to you.

We are ready to despair too soon, we are ready to say, ‘What’s the good of doing anything?’ Hope is the virtue we should cultivate most in this present day and age.

Be like the sun; warm to everyone, even your enemies.

Parents in the early half of the twentieth century were primarily concerned with the development of character in their children. They wanted to be certain that their children were ready to cope with adversity, for it was surely coming to them one day whether in personal or national life. The development of character involves self-discipline and often sacrifice of one's own desires for the good of self and others. Montessori education, developed in this historical period, reflects this emphasis on the formation of the child's character. However, parents today are more likely to say their primary wish for their children is that they be happy. In pursuit of this goal they indulge their children, often unconsciously, to a degree that is startling to previous generations. All parents need to remember that true happiness comes through having character and discipline, and living a life of meaningful contribution -- not by having and doing whatever you wish.

Light travels halfway around the world while darkness is still putting its shoes on.

May I never, I say, become that abnormal, merciless animal, that deformed monstrosity - a virtuous woman.

Obedience is the virtue that determines whether a person is either a servant or a rebel. Life of integrity is built on obedience of God's statutes and nothing else.

If this is vise I want no virtue....I know what happiness is possible to me on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it. My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose. Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish. I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs. I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice on their altars....But what is freedom? Freedom from what? There is nothing to take a man’s freedom away from him, save other men. To be free, a man must be free of his brothers. That is freedom. That and nothing else.