Loss of Integrity Quotes

Party loyalty lowers the greatest of men to the petty level of the masses.

The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded.

Shame is the dying embers of virtue.

The deterioration of a government begins almost always by the decay of its principles.

When your persona begins to take over your music and becomes more important, you enter a dangerous place. Once you have people around you who don't question you, you're in a dangerous place.

An age deficient in idealism has ever been one of immorality and superficial attainment, since without the sense of ideas, nobility of character becomes of rare attainment, if possible.

All is disgust when a man leaves his own nature and does what is unfit.

Each concession we make is accompanied by an inner diminution of which we are not immediately conscious.

It is the curse of the Labor movement that, as soon as it has acquired a certain “power,” it seeks to enlarge this power by unprincipled means. Social-Democracy also was originally “pure” in almost all countries. Most Social-patriots of today were real Marxists. By Marxist propaganda the masses were won, and as soon as the party gained “power,” they [the principled means] were abandoned.

Once you start thinking about it in a mercenary frame of mind, then you're finished. You're a joke, because there are too many mercenaries out there already.

America's conscience is bankrupt. She lost all conscience a long time ago. Uncle Sam has no conscience.

We're so obsessed with, 'Is Michael Cohen going to jail or not? Is Rod Rosenstein going to be fired? What did Trump tweet today? Did he call the press an enemy of the state?' We're so focused on that, we're missing just the tremendous damage Trump is doing to the decency and moral character of this country.

Ho said, 'I do not grieve because my feet have been cut off. I grieve because a precious jewel is dubbed a mere stone, and a man of integrity is called a deceiver. This is why I weep.'

It's fear that makes us lose our conscience. It's also what transforms us into cowards.

The saddest day of your life is when you decide to sell out, and nobody wants to buy.

He that filches from me my good name robs me of that which enriches him and makes me poor indeed.

No one can establish what selling out is.

With 'Nostromo', Joseph Conrad said that he had wanted to write a novel about the degradation of an idea. That's what we wanted to show in the case of Dustin Hoffman's character, Bernstein.

This whole phenomenon of the diversion of organizations from their purposes and ideals does not seem very serious when the scum rise to the top in the bridge club or the offices of a small magazine publisher.

Hubris, arrogance, is just one step ahead of loss of integrity, because if you think you're better than other people, you know more, then you're going to think, as many leaders have, that the rules don't apply to them - so they lose their integrity.

I used to think if you fell from grace it was more likely than not the result of one stupendous error, or else an unfortunate accident. I hadn't learned that it can happen so gradually you don't lose your stomach or hurt yourself in the landing. You don't necessarily sense the motion. I've found it takes at least two and generally three things to alter the course of a life: You slip around the truth once, and then again, and one more time, and there you are, feeling, for a moment, that it was sudden, your arrival at the bottom of the heap.

A man that has lost moral sense is like a man in battle with both of his legs shot off: he has nothing to stand on.

Once you sell yourself, it's over. You've got nothing left.

[Republicans] swapped principle for power. They ended up with neither. They deserved to lose.

Evidently the arts, all the visual arts, are becoming more democratic in the worst sense of the word.