Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means something flaming, like Joan of Arc.

A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man. His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wicked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.

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.

We moralize among ruins.

To go to the world below, having a soul which is like a vessel full of injustice, is the last and worst of all the evils.

Sometimes we look at gay being a bigger sin than being proud or not telling the truth. I don’t think God categorizes sins.

Justice is itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent departure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of being no policy at all.

Virtue consists, not in abstaining from vice, but in not desiring it.

There is no satisfaction in hanging a man who does not object to it.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.

What do I care about Jupiter? Justice is a human issue, and I do not need a god to teach it to me.

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.

Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what you are.

Those who forget good and evil and seek only to know the facts are more likely to achieve good than those who view the world through the distorting medium of their own desires.

We should not be so taken up in the search for truth, as to neglect the needful duties of active life; for it is only action that gives a true value and commendation to virtue.

Let’s pray that the human race never escapes from Earth to spread its iniquity elsewhere.

Treat those who are good with goodness, and also treat those who are not good with goodness. Thus goodness is attained. Be honest to those who are honest, and be also honest to those who are not honest. Thus honesty is attained.

There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right.

The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.

Man’s true nature being lost, everything becomes his nature; as, his true good being lost, everything becomes his good.

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

I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty.

Well, I’ll put it this way: you can certainly say belief in God makes people behave worse. That can be proved beyond a doubt.

Ethics is the activity of man directed to secure the inner perfection of his own personality.

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.

War is evil, but it is often the lesser evil.

I add this, that rational ability without education has oftener raised man to glory and virtue, than education without natural ability.

What the statesman is most anxious to produce is a certain moral character in his fellow citizens, namely a disposition to virtue and the performance of virtuous actions.

There is no austerity equal to a balanced mind, and there is no happiness equal to contentment; there is no disease like covetousness, and no virtue like mercy.

Say what you will about the ten commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them.

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.

The book, ’12 Rules For Life,‘ is a very serious book. There’s elements of humor in it, but I’m trying to struggle with things at the deepest possible level and to explain to people why it’s necessary to live a upstanding and noble and moral and truthful and responsible life, and why there’s hell to pay if you don’t do that.

Abortion is clearly wrong.

There is a moral obligation that those who have should give to those who don’t.

The function of wisdom is to discriminate between good and evil.

Morality which depends upon the helplessness of a man or woman has not much to recommend it. Morality is rooted in the purity of our hearts.

Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time.

Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.

Hatred is gained as much by good works as by evil.

What is moral is what you feel good after, and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.

That old law about ‚an eye for an eye‘ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.

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

Fear is the mother of morality.

No evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death. He and his are not neglected by the gods.

It takes two to make a murder. There are born victims, born to have their throats cut, as the cut-throats are born to be hanged.

A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side.

I think that the Bible teaches that homosexuality is a sin, but the Bible also teaches that pride is a sin, jealousy is a sin, and hate is a sin, evil thoughts are a sin. So I don’t think that homosexuality should be chosen as the overwhelming sin that we are doing today.

There is the good and the bad, the great and the low, the just and the unjust. I swear to you that all that will never change.

In truth, politeness is artificial good humor, it covers the natural want of it, and ends by rendering habitual a substitute nearly equivalent to the real virtue.

Charity creates a multitude of sins.

To practice five things under all circumstances constitutes perfect virtue; these five are gravity, generosity of soul, sincerity, earnestness, and kindness.

The thing that alarms me is that there are so many clergymen who say that the so-called ‚new morality‘ is all right. They say we’re living in a new generation; let’s be relevant, let’s change God’s law. Let’s say that adultery is all right under certain circumstances; fornication’s all right under certain circumstances. If it’s ‚meaningful.‘

If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.

The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right.

The story being told in ‚Star Wars‘ is a classic one. Every few hundred years, the story is retold because we have a tendency to do the same things over and over again. Power corrupts, and when you’re in charge, you start doing things that you think are right, but they’re actually not.

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

The difference is too nice – Where ends the virtue or begins the vice.

To assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today.

Money, not morality, is the principle commerce of civilized nations.