Goodness Quotes

Water indeed will flow indifferently to the east or west, but will it flow indifferently up or down? The tendency of our nature to good is like the tendency of water to flow downwards. There are none but have this tendency to good, just as all water flows downward.

Crime and vice generally require darkness for prowling. They disappear when light plays upon them.

The greatest honor of a man is in doing good to his fellow men, not in destroying them.

There are few things easier than to live badly and die well.

I am not in favour of this modern mania for turning bad people into good people at a moment's notice.

Error is multiform (for evil is a form of the unlimited, as in the old Pythagorean imagery, and good of the limited), whereas success is possible in one way only (which is why it is easy to fail and difficult to succeed - easy to miss the target and difficult to hit it); so this is another reason why excess and deficiency are a mark of vice, and observance of the mean a mark of virtue: Goodness is simple, badness is manifold.

Try to live the life of the good man who is more than content with what is allocated to him.

That good disposition which boasts of being most tender is often stifled by the least urging of self-interest.

When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy.

It is very hard to be simple enough to be good.

The Good of man is the active exercise of his soul's faculties in conformity with excellence or virtue, or if there be several human excellences or virtues, in conformity with the best and most perfect among them.

To be at once exceedingly wealthy and good is impossible.

Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something.

Virtue - even attempted virtue - brings light; indulgence brings fog.

Nature, which alone is good, is wholly familiar and common.

The Heart and core of everything here is good, that whatever may be the surface waves, deep down and underlying everything, there is an infinite basis of Goodness and Love.

There is no difference between knowledge and temperance; for he who knows what is good and embraces it, who knows what is bad and avoids it, is learned and temperate.

Nothing is rarer than real goodness.

Know the joy of life by piling good deed on good deed until no rift or cranny appears between them.

There is no better proof of a man's being truly good than his desiring to be constantly under the observation of good men.

Virtue alone is sweet society,It keeps the key to all heroic hearts,And opens you a welcome in them all.

I have thought a sufficient measure of civilization is the influence of good women.

Nothing is rarer than true good nature; they who are reputed to have it are generally only pliant or weak.

Every man, however obscure, however far removed from the general recognition, is one of a group of men impressible for good, and impressible for evil, and it is in the nature of things that he cannot really improve himself without in some degree improving other men.

Let us endeavor so to live so that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.

It is for you and me to show that no vice is inherent in man.

What makes a man stand up and work? Strength. Strength is goodness, weakness is sin.

Human greatness does not lie in wealth or power, but in character and goodness.

Character is "a stamp of good repute on a person."

But then in what way are things called good? They do not seem to be like the things that only chance to have the same name. Are goods one then by being derived from one good or by all contributing to one good, or are they rather one by analogy? Certainly as sight is in the body, so is reason in the soul, and so on in other cases.

It is not so important that many should be good as you, as that there be some absolute goodness somewhere; for that will leaven the whole lump.

I know this for sure, that doing good actually makes you better.

The sun too penetrates into privies, but is not polluted by them.

Perfect friendship is the friendship of men who are good, and alike in excellence; for these wish well alike to each other qua good, and they are good in themselves.

Pharisaism is not a degeneration in a good man: a large portion of it is rather the condition of all being-good.

I believe that every human mind feels pleasure in doing good to another.

In a thousand apparently humble ways men busy themselves to make some right take the place of some wrong,--if it is only to make abetter paste blacking,--and they are themselves so much the better morally for it.

Though in the order of nature angels rank above men, yet, by scale of justice, good men are of greater value than bad angels.

I am good to people who are good. I am also good to people who are not good. Because Virtue is goodness.

The good man is the only excellent musician, because he gives forth a perfect harmony not with a lyre or other instrument but with the whole of his life.

There is also something excellent in every audience,--the capacity of virtue. They are ready to be beatified.

The only thing that is good without qualification is a good will.

Begin where you are and such as you are, without aiming mainly to become of more worth, and with kindness aforethought, go about doing good.

How noble and good everyone could be if, every evening before falling asleep, they were to recall to their minds the events of the whole day and consider exactly what has been good and bad. Then without realizing it, you try to improve yourself at the start of each new day.

How good life is when one does something good and just!

It is clear that those constitutions which aim at the common good are right, as being in accord with absolute justice; while those which aim only at the good of the rulers are wrong.

See the good in people and help them.

A good thing can't be cruel.

When women cease to be handsome, they study to be good.

All men in the abstract are just and good.

Human good turns out to be activity of soul exhibiting excellence, and if there is more than one sort of excellence, in accordance with the best and most complete.Foroneswallowdoesnot makea summer, nor does one day; and so too one day, or a short time, does not make a man blessed and happy.

You can ask goodness in, show it how much you like it, make room for it. And it says, "Oh, I like this place, I think I'll stay here." Which is why people go into one house and say, "I want to take my shoes off." At another house, no matter how beautiful it is, they might say, "Hmm, I can't stay."

Good people strengthen themselves ceaselessly

If the person laughs well, they are a good person.

Highest good is like water. Because water excels in benefiting the myriad creatures without contending with them and settles where none would like to be, it comes closest to the way.

Do what is right, and you'll have no lasting regrets. Do what is right, and put yourself on the side of truth, goodness, and the best of life.

You cannot make men good by law.

Truth is handsomer than the affectation of love. Your goodness must have some edge to it, else it is none.

Though we love goodness and not stealing, yet also we love freedom and not preaching.

A man's true wealth is the good he does in the world.