Quotations: Ethics, morality


Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere.
G.K. Chesterton, English essayist and poet (1874-1936)

That which is beautiful is moral. That is all, nothing more.
Gustave Flaubert, French novelist (1821-1880)

Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the nose.
Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher (1844-1900)

Morality is simply the attitude we adopt toward people whom we personally dislike.
Oscar Wilde, Anglo-Irish wit and author (1854-1900)

The first step in the evolution of ethics is a sense of solidarity with other human beings.
Albert Schweitzer, German Nobel Peace Prize-winning mission doctor and theologian (1875-1965)

In law a man is guilty when he violates the rights of others. In ethics he is guilty if he only thinks of doing so.
Immanuel Kant, Prussian geographer and philosopher (1724-1804)

The foundation of morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying.
Thomas Henry Huxley, English evolutionist (1825-1895)

Morality is stronger than tyrants.
Louis-Antoine-Leon de Saint-Just, French revolutionary (1767-1794)

Morality, when formal, devours.
Albert Camus, French existentialist novelist (1913-1960)

A moral being is one who is capable of comparing his past and future actions or motives, and of approving or disapproving of them.
Charles Darwin, English biologist (1809-1882)

Morality begins at the point of a gun.
Mao Zedong, Chinese revolutionary and national leader (1893-1976)

Without civic morality communities perish; without personal morality their survival has no value.
Bertrand Russell, British mathematician and philosopher (1872-1970)

The essence of morality is the subjugation of nature in obedience of social needs.
John Morley, British statesman and writer (1838-1923)

Ethics is a code of values which guide our choices and actions and determine the purpose and course of our lives.
Ayn Rand, Russian-American novelist and philosopher (1905-1982)

There's a hole in the moral ozone and it's getting bigger.
Michael Josephson, American ethicist

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