Virtue Quotes - Page 13

• Great necessities call out great virtues.

  Abigail Adams

  Inspirational, Retirement, Women

  Letter to John Quincy Adams, 19 Jan. 1780

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• If you can be well without health, you may be happy without virtue.

  Edmund Burke

  May, Health Care, Wells

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• When virtue is banished, ambition invades the minds of those who are disposed to receive it, and avarice possesses the whole community. The objects of their desires are changed; what they were fond of before has become indifferent; they were free while under the restraint of laws, but they would fain now be free to act against law.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Ambition, Law, Community

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• The only amaranthine flower on earth is virtue; the only lasting treasure, truth.

  William Cowper

  Inspirational, Flower, Treasure

  William Cowper (1856). “The task, Table talk, and other poems: With critical observations of various authors on his genius and character, and notes, critical and illustrative”, p.186

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• He asks how the evil is to be remedied. I tell him that there seems to be little chance for avoiding the extremes of despotism or anarchy; that the only ground of hope must be the morals of the people, but that these are, I fear, too corrupt.

  Gouverneur Morris

  People, Evil, Littles

  Gouverneur Morris (1888). “The Diary and Letters of Gouverneur Morris: Minister of the United States to France ... Etc”

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• The United States is only one superpower. Today they lead the world. Nobody has doubts about it. Militarily. They also lead economically but they're getting weak. But they don't lead morally and politically anymore. The world has no leadership. The United States was always the last resort and hope for all other nations. There was the hope, whenever something was going wrong, one could count on the United States. Today, we lost that hope.

  Lech Walesa

  Doubt, Today, Lasts

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• The true makes of history are the spiritual men whom the world knew not, the unregarded agents of the creative action of the Spirit. The supreme instance of this-the key to the Christian understanding of history-is to be found in the Incarnation- the presence of the maker of the world in the world unknown to the world. ... The Incarnation is itself in a sense the divine fruit of history-of the fullness of time-and it finds its extension and completion in the historic life of the Church.

  Christopher Dawson

  Christian, Spiritual, Men

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• Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning.

  William S. Burroughs

  Happiness, Function, Products

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• So our virtues lie in the interpretation of the time

  William Shakespeare

  Lying, Historical, Interpretation

  William Shakespeare, Samuel Weller Singer, Edmond Malone, Charles Symmons, John Thompson (1826). “The Dramatic Works of William Shakespeare: Richard III. Henry VIII. Troilus and Cressida”, p.242

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• Let vice and immorality of every kind be discouraged as much as possible in your brigade; and, as a chaplain is allowed to each regiment, see that the men regularly attend during worship. Gaming of every kind is expressly forbidden, as being the foundation of evil, and the cause of many a brave and gallant officer's and soldier's ruin.

  George Washington

  Men, Evil, Brave

  George Washington, Jared Sparks (1834). “The Writings of George Washington: Being His Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and Other Papers, Official and Private, Selected and Published from the Original Manuscripts”, p.436

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• Our patience will achieve more than our force.

  Edmund Burke

  Inspirational, Patience, Strategy

  'Reflections on the Revolution in France' (1790) p. 249

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• Humility is the foundation of all the other virtues hence, in the soul in which this virtue does not exist there cannot be any other virtue except in mere appearance.

  Saint Augustine

  Wisdom, Fake People, Humility

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• Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

  George Washington

  Inspirational, Leadership, Honesty

  George Washington, Jared Sparks (1834). “The Writings of George Washington: Being His Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and Other Papers, Official and Private, Selected and Published from the Original Manuscripts”, p.324

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• . . . Virtue, morality, and religion. This is the armor, my friend, and this alone that renders us invincible. These are the tactics we should study. If we lose these, we are conquered, fallen indeed . . . so long as our manners and principles remain sound, there is no danger.

  Patrick Henry

  Long, Liberty, Sound

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• We are double-edged blades, and every time we whet our virtue the return stroke strops our vice.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Time, Integrity, Vices

  Henry David Thoreau (1975). “Early Essays and Miscellanies”, p.224, Princeton University Press

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• Human rights can only be assured among a virtuous people. The general government . . . can never be in danger of degenerating into a monarchy, an oligarchy, an aristocracy, or any despotic or oppresive form so long as there is any virtue in the body of the people.

  George Washington

  Rights, Government, Long

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• We may wonder at the choice of Israel and Rome as the archetypes of the new nation, in view of the long history of suffering of the former and the decline of the latter. We may wonder that our ancestors over-looked the darker days of those earlier nations. They did not. They hoped to construct a republic on principles to sound that if we should decline in piety and public virtue we would meet the inexorable fate of nations, which are as but dust in the hands of God.

  Robert Neelly Bellah

  Fate, Israel, Views

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• I enter on the trust to which I have been called by the suffrages of my fellow-citizens with my fervent prayers to the Almighty that He will be graciously pleased to continue to us that protection which He has already so conspicuously displayed in our favor.

  James Monroe

  Prayer, Citizens, Favors

  James Monroe's First Inauguration Speech, www.sfgate.com. December 16, 2008.

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• The religion of Jesus Christ aims at nothing less than the utter overthrow of all other systems of religion in the world; denouncing them as inadequate to the wants of man, false in their foundations, and dangerous in their tendency.

  Simon Greenleaf

  Jesus, Men, World

  Simon Greenleaf (1995). “The Testimony of the Evangelists: The Gospels Examined by the Rules of Evidence”, p.10, Kregel Publications

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• Jesus is the purest among the mighty, and the mightiest among the pure, who, with his pierced hand has raised empires from their foundations, turned the stream of history from its old channel, and still continues to rule and guide the ages

  Jean Paul

  Jesus, Hands, Age

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• These are no ordinary claims; and it seems hardly possible for a rational being to regard them with even a subdued interest; much less to treat them with mere indifference and contempt. If not true they are little else than the pretensions of a bold imposture, which not satisfied with having already enslaved millions of the human race, seeks to continue its encroachments upon human liberty, until all nations be subjected under its iron rule.

  Simon Greenleaf

  Iron, Race, Liberty

  Simon Greenleaf (1995). “The Testimony of the Evangelists: The Gospels Examined by the Rules of Evidence”, p.10, Kregel Publications

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• But if they are well-founded and just, they can be no less than the high requirements of heaven, addressed by the voice of God to the reason and understanding of man, concerning things deeply affecting his relations to his sovereign, and essential to the formation of his character and of course to his destiny, both for this life and for the life.

  Simon Greenleaf

  Character, Destiny, Men

  Simon Greenleaf (1995). “The Testimony of the Evangelists: The Gospels Examined by the Rules of Evidence”, p.10, Kregel Publications

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• It is easy to see that when republican virtue fails, slavery ensues.

  Thomas Paine

  Slavery, Republican, Failing

  Thomas Paine (2014). “Selected Writings of Thomas Paine”, p.19, Yale University Press

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• Patriotism is as much a virtue as justice, and is as necessary for the support of societies as natural affection is for the support of families. The Amor Patriae love of ones country is both a moral duty and a religious duty. It comprehends not only the love of our neighbors but of millions of our fellow creatures, not only of the present but of future generations. This virtue we find constitutes a part of the first characters of history.

  Benjamin Rush

  Country, Religious, Character

  Benjamin Rush (1951). “Letters of Benjamin Rush: 1761-1792”

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• What we take for virtue is often nothing but an assemblage of different actions, and of different interests, that fortune or our industry knows how to arrange.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Different, Action, Fortune

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