Mary Doria Russell Quotes

If you are doing something for reward or punishment, you do not have morality.

In essence, I set myself the objective of doing what I feel is right without having any ambition.

I figured I would always be a candidate for man of the year in the virtue-is-its-own-reward category. What that did was force me to concentrate on the work.

Good people do fundamental work because they believe in the work.

A perfect man would never act from a sense of duty; he’d always want the right thing more than the wrong one. Duty is only a substitute for love (of God and of other people) like a crutch which is a substitute for a leg. Most of us need the crutch at times; but of course it is idiotic to use the crutch when our own legs (our own loves, tastes, habits etc.) can do the journey on their own.

Do we behave out of fear of punishment, or out of the demands of our heart? For me, it is the latter, as I would hope is true for all adults, thought I know from bitter experience that such is not often the case. To act in a manner designed to catapult you into heaven would seem transparent to a god, any god,for if ones heart is not in allignment with the creator of that heaven, then... what is the point?

You should never do something kind in hopes of recognition. Do it because its right. Do it because it makes you feel good.

I need no master to punish me in order to behave as I ought. If I did, I would be no more than a child who obeys his father's rules only because he fears the whip, and not because he actually means good.

Were there no heaven nor hell I should be honest.

I have never been motivated by money.

I know, in my heart of hearts, I don't do things for money.

It's not about the money with me.

I've never been driven by fame or money or anything like that. It's never been part of my psyche.

Money has never been a motivation.

The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice,' but integrity.

Reaching into one's own pocket to assist his fellow man is noble and worthy of praise. Reaching into another person's pocket to assist one's fellow man is despicable and worthy of condemnation.

Let no man be sorry he has done good, because others have done evil.

I have tried if I could reach that great resolution . . . to be honest without a thought of Heaven or Hell.

If a man has a right to be proud of anything, it is of a good action done as it ought to be, without any base interest lurking at the bottom of it.

In doing good, we are generally cold, and languid, and sluggish; and of all things afraid of being too much in the right. But theworks of malice and injustice are quite in another style. They are finished with a bold, masterly hand; touched as they are with the spirit of those vehement passions that call forth all our energies, whenever we oppress and persecute.

Doing your best is taking the action because you love it, not because you're expecting a reward

I do not need the written code of a spiritual belief to act like a decent human being.

I have long served virtue, And never ta'en wages of her.

We must do our work for its own sake, not for fortune or attention or applause.