intrinsic goodness Quotes

Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.

It is his nature, not his standing, that makes the good man.

Also, that which is desirable in itself is more desirable than what is desirable per accidens.

I think every human being has good intentions in one aspect of life and some in every.

I am a person who believes in the good of people and who may have had things influence them to a certain degree, but deep down I think most people are good and would like to be good.

... deep down nobody is bad, only frightened.

People are inherently good. Our souls are magnificent and capable of extraordinary performance.

Human beings are fundamentally good.

Is not life in itself a thing of goodness, irrespective of whether the course it takes for us can be called a 'happy' one?

Human nature is good, just as water seeks low ground. There is no man who is not good, just as there is no water that does not flow downward.

I think there's so much good in the worst of us, and so many of the worst of us get the best of us, that the rest of us aren't even worth talking about.

You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to emerge. But it can only emerge if something fundamental changes in your state of consciousness.

But things that are intrinsically good can also become idols-if we allow them to take over any of God's functions in our lives.

The center of human nature is rooted in ten thousand ordinary acts of kindness that define our days.

Goodness cannot be imposed externally, from the top down; it must grow internally, from the bottom up.

I am a firm believer that the pull for human beings is towards the good, generally outweighing the bad.

We can work together for a better world with men and women of goodwill, those who radiate the intrinsic goodness of humankind.

Multitudes think they like to do evil; yet no man ever really enjoyed doing evil since God made the world.

One of the possible reasons why we might be good is that we're frightened, frightened of God. We want the reward in Heaven, we don't want to go to Hell. That would be an ignoble, ignominious reason for being good, and I think that if anybody was good to you just because they hoped for a heavenly reward, you wouldn't respect them, you'd probably give them a wide berth.

To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that love is the reason for my existence, for God is love. Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name.

True virtue, when she errs, needs not the eyes of men to excite her blushes; she is confounded at her own presence, and covered with confusion of face.

If you let people follow their feelings, they will be able to do good. This is what is meant by saying that human nature is good.

Even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise beyond the highest which is in each one of you, so the wicked and the weak cannot fall lower than the lowest which is in you also.

I always think that, even when people behave badly, if you like something deep inside them, then there is a tiny bit of nobility - they wish they could be good.

There were honest people long before there were Christians and there are, God be praised, still honest people where there are no Christians. It could therefore easily be possible that people are Christians because true Christianity corresponds to what they would have been even if Christianity did not exist.