William Bennett Quotes

If you want young people to take right and wrong seriously, you must put them in the presence of people who take right and wrong seriously.

Morality is not only taught; it is caught.

Human models are more vivid and more persuasive than explicit moral commands.

My parents are naive in their morality of things, and so, without realising it, I landed up being ethical and having strong opinions.

We become moral when we are unhappy.

The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live.

Fear is the mother of morality.

We are naturally moral beings, but our environments can enhance - or, sadly, degrade - this innate moral sense.

One has only as much morality as one has philosophy and poetry.

The endeavor to understand is the first and only basis of virtue.

Nothing has ever moulded our conscience so strongly as our knowledge of what is good and what is evil.

The conscience of children is formed by the influences that surround them; their notions of good and evil are the result of the moral atmosphere they breathe.

Seeking the good is not primarily about rules and commandments.

Ethics are not necessarily to do with being law-abiding. I am very interested in the moral path, doing the right thing.

I think that unless you can take judgments of right and wrong like an automaton, you must have emotions because that is our only way of moral guidance.

I believe you have to nurture your conscience.

Morals are an acquirement -- like music, like a foreign language, like piety, poker, paralysis -- no man is born with them.

Our system of morals is a body of imperfect social generalizations expressed in terms of emotion.

Basic moral values must therefore first be internalized in the hearts and minds of its people before we can hope to enforce legislation reflecting these values

There's a voice inside children that knows right from wrong. I call it listening to your inner Jiminy Cricket. I tell my daughter, 'If you're thinking this is not the best idea, it probably isn't.'

Force cannot transmit a moral principle: moral ideas can be received only through the reason of the heart.

I firmly believe there are no bad people.

Humans are the only ones who are the custodians of other people's morals.

I never condemn wrongdoing in any area.

Moralism doesn't produce morality; it produces immorality.