“Calumny is a vice of curious constitution trying to kill it keeps it alive leave it to itself and it will die a natural death.”
More from Thomas Paine on Ethics
“Immediate necessity makes many things convenient, which if continued would grow into oppressions. Expedience and right are different things.”
“A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue but moderation in principle is always a vice.”
“Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society.”
Others on Ethics
Ayn Rand
9 quotes“Sacrifice is the surrender of that which you value in favor of which you dont”
Saint Augustine
8 quotes“Beauty is indeed a good gift of God; but that the good may not think it a great good, God dispenses it even to the wicke...”
David Hume
7 quotes“Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.”
Dante
6 quotes“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in time of great moral crisis maintain their neutrality.”
Marcus Aurelius
4 quotes“The pride which is proud of want of pride is the most intolerable of all.”
Einstein
4 quotes“Everyone should be respected as an individual, but no one idolized.”
Pope Benedict XVI
4 quotes“Purity of heart is what enables us to see.”
Confucius
3 quotes“Tsze-kung wished to dispense with the sacrifice of a sheep for the New Moon ceremony. The Master said, "You love the she...”
Immanuel Kant
3 quotes“...I am never to act otherwise than so that I could also will that my maxim should become universal law.”
Adam Smith
3 quotes“In the common degree of the moral, there is no virtue. Virtue is excellence.”
Neal Shusterman
3 quotes“But remember that good intentions pave many roads. Not all of them lead to hell.”
Alexander Pope
3 quotes“Order is heaven's first law.”