Henry Ward Beecher Quotes

My beliefs will run through everything I do. My beliefs, my values are my anchor and when people try to drag me, as I know they will, it is to that sense of right and wrong, that sense of who I am and what I believe, to which I will always hold.

From long familiarity, we know what honor is. It is what enables the individual to do right in the face of complacency and cowardice. It is what enables the soldier to die alone, the political prisoner to resist, the singer to sing her song, hardly appreciated, on a side street.

I learned that moral courage is harder than physical courage.

Right is right, even if everyone is against it, and wrong is wrong, even if everyone is for it.

If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything.

Political courage is not political suicide.

'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.

I cannot surrender my principles, though the whole world besides should vote them down - I can make no compromise between truth and error, even though my life be the alternative.

Being a Deol for me is to be honest; walking with my head held high and never having to bow in front of injustice.

You have to stand on your beliefs.

Virtue is but heroic bravery, to do the thing thought to be true, in spite of all enemies of flesh or spirit, in despite of all temptations or menaces.

There are times when each of us has to have some gumption to take a stand as to what we wish to preserve or change in order to maintain our self-respect and not be as "a reed shaken with the wind" (Matt. 11:7) . . . . We lose much credibility and strength, and we risk being weighed on an uneven balance, when, Don Quixote-like, we go around "tilting windmills".

Stand up for what is right even if you stand alone.

You think that because I want to do what’s right, because I want to make things better, I’m weak,” Claire said. “Or that I’m stupid. But I’m not. It takes a lot more strength to know how bad the world is and not want to be part of that, give in to it. And I do know, Kim. Believe me.

It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to our enemies, but just as much to stand up to our friends.

Fidelity to conscience is inconsistent with retiring modesty. If it be so, let the modesty succumb. It can be only a false modesty which can be thus endangered.

Even in decline, a virtuous man increases the beauty of his behavior. A burning stick, though turned to the ground, has its flame drawn upwards.

I, for one, am actually still incredibly idealistic, and I still can credibly or very strongly believe that you have to keep fighting for what you believe in, because it's only when you stop that you've truly lost.

Never give in - never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.

One of the truest tests of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised.

Adversity is the trial of principle. Without it a man hardly knows whether he is honest or not.

I urge you to hold fast to your standards. I plead with you not to waver.

I don't know any other way to live but to wake up every day armed with my convictions, not yielding them to the threat of danger and to the power and force of people who might despise me.

The courage of New England was the courage of conscience.

Today we need a special kind of courage. Not the kind needed in battle, but a kind which makes us stand up for everything that we know is right, everything that is true and honest. We need the kind of courage that can withstand the subtle corruption of the cynics, so that we can show the world that we are not afraid of the future.