quotations about virtue
Every deed of dishonor, every victim of vice, every ghastly spectacle of crime, is an eloquent testimony to the need and the worth of virtue.
E. H. CHAPIN
Living Words
A man that hath no virtue in himself ever envieth virtue in others.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
If one doth act in friendly wise,
With no evil thought toward any single creature,
And in so doing becometh proper,
And if he have compassion in his soul
Toward all living beings--this noble one
Doth acquire abundant Virtue.
GAUTAMA BUDDHA
Iti-Vuttaka
Content with poverty, my soul I arm;
And virtue, though in rags, will keep me warm.
JOHN DRYDEN
Imitation of Horace
Happiness and Virtue clasp hands and walk together.
MADAME SWETCHINE
"Airelles", The Writings of Madame Swetchine
The virtue which requires to be ever guarded is scarcely worth the sentinel.
OLIVER GOLDSMITH
The Vicar of Wakefield
There is no road or ready way to virtue.
SIR THOMAS BROWNE
Religio Medici
There is nothing we abhor so much as to have to be virtuous in private.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
Virtue seeks the greatest distance from vice.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
We value virtue but do not discuss it. The honest bookkeeper, the faithful wife, the earnest scholar get little of our attention compared to the embezzler, the tramp, the cheat.
JOHN STEINBECK
Travels with Charley: In Search of America
It is always one's virtues and not one's vices that precipitate one into disaster.
REBECCA WEST
The Harsh Voice
As the flower, when plucked for enjoyment, begins to wither, so does virtue practiced for reward begin to vanish.
IVAN PANIN
Thoughts
When we let our virtue shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
JOE EVERETT
"Creating men of virtue", The Observer, April 20, 2017
To be virtuous is to overcome our evil inclinations. If thou hast not conquer'd thyself in that which is thy own particular weakness, thou hast no title to virtue, tho' thou art free of other men's.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
I have my own virtue, which I am constantly cultivating and refining by teaching myself not to tolerate in me or my surroundings anything but the exquisite.
ANDRE GIDE
Pretexts: Reflections on Literature and Morality
Whenever you are to do a thing, though it can never be known but to yourself, ask yourself how you would act were all the world looking at you, and act accordingly.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
letter to Peter Carr, August 19, 1785
It matters not from what stock we are descended so long as we have virtue; for that alone is true Nobility.
WELLINS CALCOTT
Thoughts Moral and Divine
There are some persons on whom virtue sits almost as ungraciously as vice.
ELIZA COOK
Diamond Dust
Wealth is useless on the day of wrath, but virtue saves from death.
BIBLE
Proverbs 11:4
God hath not called us that we should be unclean, but holy and virtuous.
THOMAS BECON
Writings of the Rev. Thomas Becon