William James Quotes

The power of choosing good and evil is within the reach of all.

There is nothing good or evil save in the will.

The act of willing this or that, of choosing among various courses of conduct, is central in the realm of ethics.

To prefer evil to good is not in human nature; and when a man is compelled to choose one of two evils, no one will choose the greater when he might have the less.

While early childhood experiences may impel, they do not compel. In the end, evil is a matter of choice.

Action indeed is the sole medium of expression for ethics.

A moral choice in its basic terms appears to be a choice that favors survival: a choice made in favor of life.

Each decision - to kill, to sign a petition, to write a letter, to make a speech, to attack, to lie, to surrender - was made at some point in somebody's day.

Eve didn't choose to eat the apple. She was tempted by the serpent." "Yes," I argue, thoughts coming out half-formed. "But...she didn't have to take a bite. She chose to.

Here in St. Cloud’s,” Dr. Larch wrote, “ I have been given the choice of playing God or leaving practically everything up to chance. It is my experience that practically everything is left up to chance much of the time; men who believe in good and evil, and who believe that good should win, should watch for those moments when it is possible to play God – we should seize those moments. There won’t be may

No intelligent man believes that anybody ever willingly errs or willingly does base and evil deeds; they are well aware that all who do base and evil things do them unwillingly.

I believe firmly that in making ethical decisions, man has the prerogative of true freedom of choice.

To what extent is any given man morally responsible for any given act? We do not know.

Morality may consist solely in the courage of making a choice.

Wisdom we know is the knowledge of good and evil, not the strength to choose between the two.

I would like us to think about it more explicitly, and not take our intuitions as the given of ethics, but rather to reflect on it, and be more open about the fact that something is an ethical issues and think what we ought to do about it.

Though many have tried, no one has ever yet explained away the decisive fact that science, which can do so much, cannot decide what it ought to do.

To deny the freedom of the will is to make morality impossible.

There is but one right, and the possibilities of wrong are infinite.

No one is born evil; it's just the choices that they make.

It's easy to get into the grey zone [of ethics].

The more...we consider man to be free, the less we can say, that he can neglect to use reason, or choose evil in preference to good

One's concern with the ethics of means and ends varies inversely with one's personal interest in the issue ... Any effective means is automatically judged by the opposition as being unethical.

Everythings a choice. Nobody's born good. Nobody's born evil. It's always a choice.

We can now destroy or we can cherish-the choice is ours.