Motivational Quotes

Virtue

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.

- Confucius

Best Quotes about Virtue

Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.

Fitzgerald, F. Scott

The deadliest foe to virtue would be complete self-knowledge.

Bradley, Francis H.

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.

Machiavelli, Niccolo

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. [Galatians 5:23, 24]

Bible

Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience.

Smith, Adam

What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another s. We see so much only as we possess.

Thoreau, Henry David

With virtue you can't be entirely poor; without virtue you can't really be rich.

Proverb, Chinese

To a superior race of being the pretensions of mankind to extraordinary sanctity and virtue must seem... ridiculous.

Hazlitt, William

10.

Even virtue is fairer when it appears in a beautiful person.

Virgil

11.

Virtue is reason which has become energy.

Schlegel, Friedrich

12.

Better keep yourself clean and bright. You are the window through which you must see the world.

Shaw, George Bernard

13.

Unless the reformer can invent something which substitutes attractive virtues for attractive vices, he will fail.

Lippmann, Walter

14.

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.

Chesterton, Gilbert K.

15.

People who are in a fortunate position always attribute virtue to what makes them so happy.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

16.

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

Burke, Edmund

17.

To realize that you do not understand is a virtue; Not to realize that you do not understand is a defect.

Lao-Tzu

18.

Virtue that wavers is not virtue.

Milton, John

19.

Virtue must be valuable, if men and women of all degrees pretend to have it.

Howe, Edgar Watson

20.

Nothing in our times has become so unattractive as virtue.

Dahlberg, Edward

21.

Virtue is a sure anchor.

Motto

22.

I have never seen a man as fond of virtue as of women.

Confucius

23.

Temperance and labor are the two best virtues. Labor whets the appetite, temperance curbs it.

24.

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

Shaw, George Bernard

25.

The highest virtue found in the tropics is chastity, and in the colder regions, temperance.

Bovee, Christian Nevell

26.

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.

Suso, Heinrich

27.

I used to be snow white, but I drifted.

West, Mae

28.

Purity is the feminine, truth the masculine of honor.

Hare, David

29.

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?

Kempis, Thomas

30.

Virtue is the strongest shield.

Motto

31.

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.

Duganne, Augustine J.

32.

It is as hard to satirize well a man of distinguished vices, as to praise well a man of distinguished virtues.

Swift, Jonathan

33.

Virtue cannot separate itself from reality without becoming a principle of evil.

Camus, Albert

34.

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.

Duncan, Isadora

35.

There is no man so good, who, were he to submit all his thoughts and actions to the laws, would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

36.

The most virtuous are those who content themselves with being virtuous without seeking to appear so.

Plato

37.

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.

Philokalia

38.

Of all the benefits which virtue confers on us, the contempt of death is one of the greatest.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

39.

When you can't have anything else, you can have virtue.

Marquis, Don

40.

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.

Jung, Carl

41.

Why does a virtuous man take delight in the landscapes? Because the din 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.

His, Kuo

42.

If one is not virtuous he becomes vicious.

Bovee, Christian Nevell

43.

Virtue is like health: the harmony of the whole man.

Carlyle, Thomas

44.

Most virtue is a demand for greater seduction.

Barney, Natalie Clifford

45.

The person who talks most of his own virtue is often the least virtuous.

Nehru, Jawaharlal

46.

Few people have the virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

Washington, George

47.

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.

Hinckley, Gordon B.

48.

We do not place especial value on the possession of a virtue until we notice its total absence in our opponent.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

49.

From Obedience and submission comes all our virtues, and all sin is comes from self-opinion.

Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De

50.

Wickedness is always easier than virtue, for it takes a short cut to everything.

Johnson, Samuel