Ethical Evaluation Quotes

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written.

I just think that only God will judge a person's heart.

Every act of every man is a moral act, to be tested by moral, and not by economic criteria.

No degree of antiquity can give sanction to a usage bad in itself.

To judge a man means nothing more than to ask: What content does he give to the form of humanity? What concept should we have of humanity if he were its only representative?

Corruption requires looking into someone's soul and making judgments about their intent.

I think most people are indifferent in their evaluation of what is good or bad.

If you ask me if I have this or that principle, tell me what its consequences are, and then I'll tell you whether I have that principle or not.

The fundamental defect of Christian ethics consists in the fact that it labels certain classes of acts 'sins' and others 'virtue' on grounds that have nothing to do with their social consequences.

The greatest historian should also be a great moralist. It is no proof of impartiality to treat wickedness and goodness on the same level.

Intelligence is not a moral category.

It was wrong to be too pragmatic, to judge people solely by results; it was more humane to judge by intentions.

A man is not good or bad for one action.

Evil is obvious only in retrospect.

The most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men.

Every word that judges value is circular. 'Good' is 'right' is 'proper' is 'just' is 'good'. But check the examples, and they're not circular at all: Every one says 'makes me happy'.

The bad man is the man who no matter how good he has been is beginning to deteriorate, to grow less good. The good man is the man who no matter how morally unworthy he has been is moving to become better. Such a conception makes one severe in judging himself and humane in judging others.

A condition which of declension would indicate a devil, may of growth indicate a saint.

Every person, as every institution, and, above all, every religion is to be judged not by the amount of atrocities or the wrong committed but by the right conduct.

Man considers the actions, but God weighs the intentions.

However, I never thought that [George W.] Bush himself was, in any sense, "evil."

I've always been interested in definitions, because in the Bible, the Ten Commandments are there but there's no real clear definition of what sin is, in a fundamental sense - how we can use the words to evaluate our lives as we go along: Am I doing something that is ethically good? Am I being worthwhile in my life at this moment?

It is more difficult to praise rightly than to blame.

Social rules are susceptible to moral analysis. This is, again, relatively familiar in the domestic case, where we now condemn slavery as unjust. And when we affirm this judgment, we're not merely saying that all those people who owned slaves were unethical people; they shouldn't have done that. We do believe this, but that's only part of the point. We also believe that the fugitive slave laws were unjust.

Willing or preferring is the same with respect to good and evil, that judging is with respect to truth or falsehood.