ethics

"It is doubtful whether the translation “moral” is adequate anywhere in the Ethics where Spinoza rigorously exhibits his system. The opinion that he is one of the greatest opponents of moralism that ev…"

"The use of cases is to establish principles; if the cases decide different from the principles, I must follow the principles, not the decisions."

"Our virtues and our failings are inseparable, like force and matter. When they separate, man is no more."

"By consequence I hold that no one ever did, or can do, anything for "society."… Comte invented the term altruism as an antonym for egoism, and it found its way at once into everyone's mouth, although …"

"The righteous will claim sole domain on judgment. The righteous are the first to make hands into fists, the first to shout down dissenters, the first to bully others into compliance."

"The ceremonial as opposed to the haphazard characterizes piety."

"As you can see this is a composition of vertical and horizontal lines which will have to express the idea of rising upwards, of magnitude. This is the same idea which used, for example, to be the guid…"

"Insurance companies nowadays apply the principle of so-called 'selection by insurance'; this means that they take into consideration the fact that persons who enter early into insurance contracts are …"

"If you had to constitute new societies, you might on moral and social grounds prefer cornfields to cotton factories, an agricultural to a manufacturing population. But our lot is cast, and we cannot r…"

"This business of saving souls had not ethics; every human relationship was shamelessly exploited. In essence, the tribe was asking us whether we shared its feelings; if we refused to join the church, …"

"I have ever deemed it more honorable and profitable, too, to set a good example than to follow a bad one."

"Harsha was a fellow-traveller: not yet a full convert to Islam , but quite adapted to the Islamic ways, for "he ever fostered with money the Turks, who were his centurions".... This behaviour was so u…"

"We send our off to some disputed zone, full of local intrigue and power blocs and uncertainty and danger, and they are supposed to save lives not with their weapons, but through their competence and t…"

"I need hardly say that I agree with almost every word of my critics. I have repeatedly dwelt on the entirely hypothetical character of the dates I ventured to assign to the first three periods of Vedi…"

"There is a major disaster when a person allows some success to become a stopping place rather than a way station on to a larger goal. It often happens that an early success is a greater moral hazard t…"

"The moral of 'The Three Bears,' for instance, is 'Never break into someone else's house." The moral of "Snow White" is "Never eat apples." The moral of World War One is "Never assassinate Archduke Fer…"

"In order to join vigorously in the moral work of the world I must believe that somehow the best I can accomplish will endure, will leave its trace on things, will aid the final consummation."

"I don’t ever see any character as 100 percent good or 100 percent evil…"

"Opposed to atomism and behaviorism, the systems view of man links him again with the world he lives in, for he is seen as emerging in that world and reflecting its general character."

"It lost ground from contempt more than from hatred; and was rather jeered at as an ass, than dreaded as a lion. This is the general character of aristocracy, or what are called Nobles or Nobility, or …"