Moral Foundations Quotes

The foundations of national morality must be laid in private families.

The moral consequences of totalitarian propaganda...are destructive of all morals because they undermind one of the foundations of all morals: the sense of and respect for truth.

I learned that public service is a privilege that must be based on moral foundations.

Dutch values are based on Christianity, on Judaism, on humanism.

I behold the surest pledges, that as on one side, no local prejudices, or attachments; no seperate views, nor party animosities, will misdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great assemblage of communities and interests: so, on another, that the foundations of our National policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; and the pre-eminence of a free Government, be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its Citizens, and command the respect of the world.

If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values - that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.

I regard the death penalty as a savage and immoral institution that undermines the moral and legal foundations of society.

I regard the death penalty as a savage and immoral institution that undermines the moral and legal foundations of society. I reject the notion that the death penalty has any essential deterrent effect on potential offenders. I am convinced that the contrary is true - that savagery begets only savagery.

If we leave our values at the door, we give up some of the moral glue that has held our country together

Originally, ethics has no existence apart from religion, which holds it in solution.

The problem of good as it faces the atheist is this: Nature, which is the nuts-and-bolts reality for the atheist, has no values and thus can offer no grounding for good and evil. Values on the atheist view are subjective and contingent.

I did say that in-group, authority and purity are necessary for the maintenance of order, but I would never give them a blanket endorsement.

By helping to raise man above the level of bestial vegetation, faith contributes in reality to the securing and safeguarding of his existence. Take away from present-day mankind its education-based, religious-dogmatic principles- or, practically speaking, ethical-moral principles- by abolishing this religious education, but without replacing it by an equivalent, and the result will be a grave shock to the foundations of their existence.

There were certain questions about the foundations of morals that advances in science all threaten to make more complicated.

A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true.

Principles don't die. They aren't here one day and gone the next. They can't be destroyed by fire, earthquake or theft. Principles are deep, fundamental truths, classic truths.

The one kind of person I have a lot of trouble understanding is the kind of person that says the existence of God or religion doesn't matter, it's not an important decision. I think it's vitally important; it's what all our lives are based on.

Absolute tolerance is altogether impossible; the allegedly absolute tolerance turns into ferocious hatred of those who have stated clearly and most forcefully that there are unchangeable standards founded in the nature of man and the nature of things.

What I do deny is that you can build any enduring society without some such mystical ethos.

Four innate sentiments dispose people to a universal moral sense. These are sympathy, fairness, self-control and duty.

The education of youth should be watched with the most scrupulous attention. [I]t is much easier to introduce and establish an effectual system ... than to correct by penal statutes the ill effects of a bad system. ... The education of youth ... lays the foundations on which both law and gospel rest for success.

Our morality is based on so many factors: of where we were born, who we were born to, what values were instilled in us, what values we chose, the way that our lives have shaped us. That dictates so much of what we assume is our morality, and also the culture, all of these things.

Principles are eternal.

Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws.

The foundations of morality are like all other foundations: If you dig too much about them, the superstructure will come tumbling down.