Ethics and virtue
“The unexamined life is not worth living.”
— Plato, Apology
“Act only on that maxim whereby thou canst at the same time will that it should become a universal law.”
— Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
“Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things.”
— Epictetus, A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus with the Encheiridion
“All that we are is the result of what we have thought: it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts.”
— Dhammapada, The Dhammapada
“Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time: hatred ceases by love, this is an old rule.”
— Dhammapada, The Dhammapada
“The best revenge is not to copy him that wronged you.”
— Marcus Aurelius, The Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
“Mutual aid is as much a law of animal life as mutual struggle.”
— Peter Kropotkin, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution
“Virtue can only flourish amongst equals.”
— Mary Wollstonecraft, A vindication of the rights of men, in a letter to the Right Honourable Edmund B
“Philosophers have only interpreted the world in different ways. What is crucial, however, is to change it.”
— Karl Marx, Theses on Feuerbach
“Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the oftener and the more steadily we reflect on them: the starry heavens above and the moral law within.”
— Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason
“It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.”
— John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism
“Act as if the maxim of thy action were to become by thy will a Universal Law of Nature.”
— Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
“No evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.”
— Plato, Apology
“However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names.”
— Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods
“Begin at once to live, and count each separate day as a separate life.”
— Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Moral Letters to Lucilius (Epistulae Morales)
“A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction.”
— John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
“To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties.”
— Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The social contract & discourses
“Morality is not properly the doctrine how we should make ourselves happy, but how we should become worthy of happiness.”
— Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason
“False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.”
— Plato, Phaedo
“Not to commit any sin, to do good, and to purify one's mind, that is the teaching of (all) the Awakened.”
— Dhammapada, The Dhammapada
“To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.”
— Confucius, The Analects of Confucius (from the Chinese Classics)
“Recompense injury with justice, and recompense kindness with kindness.”
— Confucius, The Analects of Confucius (from the Chinese Classics)
“He who does wrong does wrong against himself. He who acts unjustly acts unjustly to himself, because he makes himself bad.”
— Marcus Aurelius, Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
“Adapt yourself to the things which your destiny has given you: love those with whom it is your lot to live, and love them with sincere affection.”
— Marcus Aurelius, The Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
“Blessedness is not the reward of virtue, but virtue itself.”
— Baruch Spinoza, Ethics — Part 5
“Knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.”
— Plato, The Republic
“He who fears death will never act as becomes a living man.”
— Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Of Peace of Mind
“A man's character is his daemon.”
— Heraclitus, The fragments of the work of Heraclitus of Ephesus on nature; translated from th
“He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”
— Bible, The Holy Bible (King James Version)