An aphorism is nothing else but the slightest
QUOTES AND APHORISMS ON VIRTUE
Great necessities call out great virtues.
Abigail Adams (1744-1818, American First Lady)
Some virtues are only seen in affliction and others only in prosperity.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719, British essayist, poet, statesman)
The highest virtue found in the tropics is chastity, and in the colder regions, temperance.
John Christian Bovee (1820-1904, American author, lawyer)
A homely face and no figure have aided many women heavenward.
Minna Antrim (1861-1950, American epigrammist)
All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.
Aristotle (BC 384-322, Greek philosopher)
Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved.
Aristotle (BC 384-322, Greek philosopher)
The greatest virtues are those which are most useful to other persons.
Aristotle (BC 384-322, Greek philosopher)
Virtue is like a rich stone, best plain set.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626, British philosopher, essayist, statesman)
A virtue to be serviceable must, like gold, be alloyed with some commoner, but more durable alloy.
Samuel Butler (1612-1680, British poet, satirist)
Most virtue is a demand for greater seduction.
Natalie Clifford Barney (1876-1972, American-born French author)
There are in every man, always, two simultaneous allegiances, one to God, the other to Satan. Invocation of God, or Spirituality, is a desire to climb higher; that of Satan, or animality, is delight in descent.
Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867, French poet)
For what is done or learned by one class of women becomes, by virtue of their common womanhood, the property of all women.
Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910, British-born American doctor)
Virtue, like a dowerless beauty, has more admirers than followers.
Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington (1789-1849, Irish writer and socialite)
If one is not virtuous he becomes vicious.
John Christian Bovee (1820-1904, American author, lawyer)
The deadliest foe to virtue would be complete self-knowledge.
Francis H. Bradley (1846-1924, British philosopher)
The virtuous control themselves.
Buddha (568-488 BC, Indian born, founder of Buddhism)
If you can be well without health, you may be happy without virtue.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797, British political writer, statesman)
Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning.
William S. Burroughs (1914-1997, American writer)
If we've learned anything in the past quarter century, it is that we cannot federalize virtue.
George H. Bush (1924-, American President (41st))
Rare virtues are like rare plants or animals, things that have not been able to hold their own in the world. A virtue to be serviceable must, like gold, be alloyed with some commoner but more durable metal.
Samuel Butler (1612-1680, British poet, satirist)
Virtue knows that it is impossible to get on without compromise, and tunes herself, as it were, a trifle sharp to allow for an inevitable fall in playing.
Samuel Butler (1612-1680, British poet, satirist)
Virtue cannot separate itself from reality without becoming a principle of evil.
Albert Camus (1913-1960, French existential writer)
Virtue is like health: the harmony of the whole man.
Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881, Scottish philosopher, author)
Man seems to be capable of great virtues but not of small virtues; capable of defying his torturer but not of keeping his temper.
Gilbert K. Chesterton (1874-1936, British author)
The chief assertion of religious morality is that white is a color. Virtue is not the absence of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and separate thing, like pain or a particular smell.
Gilbert K. Chesterton (1874-1936, British author)
We may eventually come to realize that chastity is no more a virtue than malnutrition.
Alexander Comfort
Five things constitute perfect virtue: gravity, magnanimity, earnestness, sincerity, kindness.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
He who governs by way of virtue can be compared to the North Pole Star, which keeps its place while all the other stars position themselves around it.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
I have never seen a man as fond of virtue as of women.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
To be able under all circumstances to practice five things constitutes perfect virtue; these five things are gravity, generosity of soul, sincerity, earnestness and kindness.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
While practicing virtue during normal situations, the superior person always makes further effort when there is a deficiency, and never goes over the limit where excess is approaching.
Confucius (BC 551-479, Chinese ethical teacher, philosopher)
Nothing in our times has become so unattractive as virtue.
Edward Dahlberg (1900-1977, American author, critic)
People praise virtue, but they hate it, they run away from it. It freezes you to death, and in this world you've got to keep your feet warm.
Denis Diderot (1713-1784, French philosopher)
What is virtue? It is to hold yourself to your fullest development as a person and as a responsible member of the human community.
Arthur Dobrin
Pleasure which must be enjoyed at the expense of another's pain, can never be enjoyed by a worthy mind. Pleasure's couch is virtues grave.
Augustine J. Duganne
Virtuous people are simply those who have not been tempted sufficiently, because they live in a vegetative state, or because their purposes are so concentrated in one direction that they have not had the leisure to glance around them.
Isadora Duncan (1878-1927, American dancer)
A weed is a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882, American poet, essayist)
The less a man thinks or knows about his virtues, the better we like him.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882, American poet, essayist)
The only reward of virtue is virtue.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882, American poet, essayist)
The virtue in most request is conformity.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882, American poet, essayist)
The virtues of society are vices of the saint. The terror of reform is the discovery that we must cast away our virtues, or what we have always esteemed such, into the same pit that has consumed our grosser vices.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882, American poet, essayist)
Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940, American writer) Author's website: www.fitzgeraldsociety.org
My generation of radicals and breakers-down never found anything to take the place of the old virtues of work and courage and the old graces of courtesy and politeness.
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940, American writer) Author's website: www.fitzgeraldsociety.org
God will certainly reward virtue and punish vice, either here or hereafter.
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790, American scientist, publisher, diplomat)
Be generous, good and just, when anything is to be gained by virtue.
Billy Boy Franklin
Virtue is the only true nobility.
Thomas Fuller (1608-1661, British clergyman, author)
People who are in a fortunate position always attribute virtue to what makes them so happy.
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-, American economist)
A virtuous man will teach himself to recollect the principle of universal benevolence as often as pious men repeat their prayers.
William Godwin
Since when do grown men and women, who presume to hold high government office and exercise what they think of as "moral leadership," require ethics officers to tell them whether it is or isn't permissible to grab the secretary's behind or redirect public funds to their own personal advantage?
Meg Greenfield
Purity is the feminine, truth the masculine of honor.
David Hare (1947-, British playwright, director)
To a superior race of being the pretensions of mankind to extraordinary sanctity and virtue must seem... ridiculous.
William Hazlitt (1778-1830, British essayist)
There is no substitute for virtue. Keep your thoughts virtuous. Rise above the filth that's all around you in this world and stand tall in strength and virtue. You can do this and you will be happier for it for as long as you live. God bless you in cherishing, developing and holding on to this great gift, the quality of personal virtue.
Gordon B. Hinckley
Why does a virtuous man take delight in the landscapes? Because the dim of the dusty world and the locked-in-ness of human habitations are what human nature habitually abhors; while on the contrary, haze, mist, and the haunting spirits of the mountains are what human nature seeks, and yet can rarely find.
Kuo His
It is of no consequence of what parents a man is born, as long as he be a man of merit.
Horace (BC 65-8, Italian poet)
Virtue must be valuable, if men and women of all degrees pretend to have it.
Edgar Watson Howe (1853-1937, American journalist, author)
The wise man applauds he who he thinks most virtuous; the rest of the world applauds the wealthy.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784, British author)
Virtue is too often merely local.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784, British author)
Wickedness is always easier than virtue, for it takes a short cut to everything.
Samuel Johnson (1709-1784, British author)
Wisdom is knowing what to do next, skill is knowing how to do it, and virtue is doing it.
David Starr Jordan (1851-1931, American biologist, educator)
I cannot love anyone if I hate myself. That is the reason why we feel so extremely uncomfortable in the presence of people who are noted for their special virtuousness, for they radiate an atmosphere of the torture they inflict on themselves. That is not a virtue but a vice.
Carl Jung (1875-1961, Swiss psychiatrist)
You are a man, not God; you are human, not an angel. How can you expect to remain always in a constant state of virtue, when this was not possible even for an angel of Heaven, nor for the first man in the Garden?
Thomas a Kempis (1379-1471, German monk, mystic, religious writer)
The time is always right to do what is right.
Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968, American Civil Rights leader, Nobel Prize winner, 1964)
However wicked men may be, they do not dare condemn virtue openly. Thus, when they want to attack virtue, they pretend it is false or charge it with crimes.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
Our virtues are usually just disguised vices.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
Rank is to virtue what dress is to a pretty woman.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
The world rewards the appearance of virtue more often than it reward the virtue itself.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
There may be virtue skill without position, but there is no position without some kind of virtue skill.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
Virtue would not go far if vanity did not accompany her.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
We need greater virtues to sustain good fortune than bad.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
We should not judge a man's virtue by his great abilities, but by the use he makes of them.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
We try to make a virtue of the vices that we are unwilling to correct.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
What we call virtues are often just a collection of casual actions and selfish interests which chance or our own industry manages to arrange in a certain way. It is not always from valor that men are valiant, or from chastity that women are chaste.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
When we exaggerate our friends' tenderness towards us, it is often less from gratitude than from a desire to exhibit our own virtue.
Francois De La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680, French classical writer)
To realize that you do not understand is a virtue; not to realize that you do not understand is a defect.
Lao-Tzu (BC 600-?, Chinese philosopher, founder of Taoism)
To many people virtue consists chiefly in repenting faults, not in avoiding them.
Georg C. Lichtenberg (1742-1799, German physicist, satirist)
Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.
Georg C. Lichtenberg (1742-1799, German physicist, satirist)
Unless the reformer can invent something which substitutes attractive virtues for attractive vices, he will fail.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974, American journalist)
The first time you see Winston Churchill you see all his faults and the rest of your life you spend discovering his virtues.
Lady Constance Lytton
The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuously in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous.
Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527, Italian author, statesman)
When you can't have anything else, you can have virtue.
Don Marquis (1878-1937, American humorist, journalist)
I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.
John Milton (1608-1674, British poet)
Virtue that wavers is not virtue.
John Milton (1608-1674, British poet)
From Obedience and submission comes all our virtues, and all sin is come from self-opinion.
Michel Eyquem De Montaigne (1533-1592, French philosopher, essayist)
Of all the benefits which virtue confers on us, the contempt of death is one of the greatest.
Michel Eyquem De Montaigne (1533-1592, French philosopher, essayist)
Virtue craves a steep and thorny path.
Michel Eyquem De Montaigne (1533-1592, French philosopher, essayist)
Virtue rejects facility to be her companion. She requires a craggy, rough and thorny way.
Michel Eyquem De Montaigne (1533-1592, French philosopher, essayist)
Virtue alone is invincible.
Motto
Virtue is a sure anchor.
Motto
Virtue is the strongest shield.
Motto
Virtue survives the grave.
Motto
All art is a struggle to be, in a particular sort of way, virtuous.
Iris Murdoch (1919-, British novelist, philosopher)
The person who talks most of his own virtue is often the least virtuous.
Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964, Indian nationalist, statesman)
Virtue is its own reward, and brings with it the truest and highest pleasure; but if we cultivate it only for pleasure's sake, we are selfish, not religious, and will never gain the pleasure, because we can never have the virtue.
John Henry Newman (1801-1890, British religious leader, prelate, writer)
Often devotion to virtue arises from sated desire.
Laurence Hope Nicolson
We do not place especial value on the possession of a virtue until we notice its total absence in our opponent.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900, German philosopher)
The great majority of successful business men and women have been and are possessors of strong personalities of the right sort, and by analyzing their climb to success it is amazing to discover how large a part good manners, good breeding, and correct behavior have had in helping them to win the goal.
Ida White Parker
To be innocent is to be not guilty; but to be virtuous is to overcome our evil inclinations.
William Penn (1644-1718, British religious leader, founder of Pennsylvania)
The most virtuous are those who content themselves with being virtuous without seeking to appear so.
Plato (BC 427?-347?, Greek philosopher)
Virtuous and vicious everyone must be; few in extremes, but all in degree.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744, British poet, critic, translator)
When men grow virtuous in their old age, they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil's leavings.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744, British poet, critic, translator)
Those who set their minds on virtue will do no evil.
Chinese Proverb (Sayings of Chinese origin)
With virtue you can't be entirely poor; without virtue you can't really be rich.
Chinese Proverb (Sayings of Chinese origin)
Sell not virtue to purchase wealth.
English Proverb (Sayings of British origin)
To give quickly is a great virtue.
Hindu Proverb
Wisdom and virtue are like the two wheels of a cart.
Japanese Proverb (Sayings of Japanese origin)
Virtue is harmony.
Pythagoras (BC 582-507, Greek philosopher, mathematician)
The Department of Justice is committed to asking one central question of everything we do: What is the right thing to do? Now that can produce debate, and I want it to be spirited debate. I want the lawyers of America to be able to call me and tell me: Janet, have you lost your mind?
Janet Reno
Mona Lisa is the only beauty who went through history and retained her reputation.
Will Rogers (1879-1935, American humorist, actor)
Virtue is a state of war, and to live in it we have always to combat with ourselves.
Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778, Swiss political philosopher, educationist, essayist)
Ah, Eugenie, have done with virtues! Among the sacrifices that can be made to those counterfeit divinities, is there one worth an instant of the pleasures one tastes in outraging them?
Marquis De Sade (1740-1814, French author)
The glory that goes with wealth and beauty is fleeting and fragile; virtue is a possession glorious and eternal.
Sallust (BC 86-34, Roman historian)
True virtue has no limits, but goes on and on, and especially holy charity, which is the virtue of virtues, and which, having an infinite object, would become infinite if it could meet with a heart capable of infinity.
St. Francis De Sales (1567-1622, Roman Catholic bishop, writer)
Virtue is reason which has become energy.
Friedrich Schlegel (1772-1829, German philosopher, critic, writer)
You have to count on living every single day in a way you believe will make you feel good about your life, so that if it were over tomorrow, you'd be content.
Jane Seymour
Assume a virtue if you have it not.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616, British poet, playwright, actor)
Men's evil manners live in brass, their virtues we write in water.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616, British poet, playwright, actor)
Men's evil manners live in brass, their virtues we write in water.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616, British poet, playwright, actor)
Better keep yourself clean and bright. You are the window through which you must see the world.
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950, Irish-born British dramatist)
What is virtue but the Trade Unionism of the married?
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950, Irish-born British dramatist)
Virtue can only flourish among equals.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797-1851, British novelist)
Virtues, like essences, lose their fragrance when exposed.
William Shenstone (1714-1763, British poet)
Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience.
Adam Smith (1723-1790, Scottish economist)
The act of acting morally is behaving as if everything we do matters.
Gloria Steinem (1934-, American feminist writer, editor)
Thou shalt understand that it is a science most profitable, and passing all other sciences, for to learn to die. For a man to know that he shall die, that is common to all men; as much as there is no man that may ever live or he hath hope or trust thereof; but thou shalt find full few that hath this cunning to learn to die. I shall give thee the mystery of this doctrine; the which shall profit thee greatly to the beginning of ghostly health, and to a stable fundamental of all virtues.
Heinrich Suso
It is as hard to satirize well a man of distinguished vices, as to praise well a man of distinguished virtues.
Jonathan Swift (1667-1745, Anglo-Irish satirist)
A pleasant traveling companion on a journey is as good as a carriage. Each day is the scholar of yesterday.
Publilius Syrus (85 BC- 43BC, Roman writer)
But do not let immorality or any impurity or greed even be named among you, as is proper among saints.
The Holy Bible (Sacred scriptures of Christians and Judaism) Source: Ephesians 5:3
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
The Holy Bible (Sacred scriptures of Christians and Judaism) Source: Galatians 5:23, 24
That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another’s. We see so much only as we possess.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862, American essayist, poet, naturalist)
There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons of virtue to one virtuous man.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862, American essayist, poet, naturalist)
Be virtuous and you will be eccentric.
Mark Twain (1835-1910, American humorist, writer)
Virtue has never been as respectable as money.
Mark Twain (1835-1910, American humorist, writer)
If we had to seek virtue outside of ourselves, that would assuredly be difficult, but as it is within us, it suffices to avoid bad thoughts and to keep our souls turned toward the Lord.
Author Unknown
It is by those only who are truly great, that virtue is esteemed more than riches or honors, or that virtuous actions can be duly appreciated.
Author Unknown
Temperance and labor are the two best virtues. Labor whets the appetite, temperance curbs it.
Author Unknown
Even virtue is fairer when it appears in a beautiful person.
Virgil (c. 70 - 19 BC, Roman poet)
The only virtue a character needs to possess between hard covers, even if he bears a real person's name, is vitality: if he comes to life in our imaginations, he passes the test.
Stephen Vizinczey (1933-, Hungarian novelist, critic)
A person's greatest virtue is his ability to correct his mistakes and continually make a new person of himself.
Yang-Ming Wang
Few people have the virtue to withstand the highest bidder.
George Washington (1732-1799, American President (1st))
I used to be snow white, but I drifted.
Mae West (1892-1980, American actress)
Virtue has its own reward, but no sales at the box office.
Mae West (1892-1980, American actress)
It is easy enough to be virtuous When nothing tempts you to stray; When without or within No voice of sin Is luring your soul away. But it is only a negative virtue until it is tried by fire. For the soul that is worth the treasures of the earth is the soul that resists desire.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1855-1919, American poet, journalist)
Nothing is illegal if one hundred businessmen decide to do it.
Andrew Young (1932-, Civil rights activist, protestant minister, public official)
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