Walter Scott Quotes

Happiness is secured through virtue; it is a good attained by man's own will.

It is better to suffer wrong than to do wrong, because you can remain the friend of the sufferer; who would want to be the friend of and have to live together with a murderer? Not even another murderer.

It is as easy for most of us to keep from stealing our dinners as it is to digest them, and there is quite as much voluntary morality involved in one process as the other.

In all men is evil sleeping; the good man is he who will not awaken it, in himself or in other men.

Know that morality is a curb, not a spur.

There is not in all America a more dangerous trait than the deification of mere smartness unaccompanied by any sense of moral responsibility.

Power isn't about doing something terrible to someone who's weaker than you, Reiner. It's having the strength to do something terrible, and choosing not to.

You are wrong, sir, if you think that a man who is any good at all should take into account the risk of life or death; he should look to this only in his actions, whether what he does is right or wrong, whether he is acting like a good or a bad man.

The most important attribute of man as a moral being is the faculty of self-control.

Genius does not excuse evil.

He deserves praise who does not what he may, but what he ought.

Each day, each one of us chooses not to do many things that would be legal but offensive to those around us.

It is his restraint that is honorable to a person, not their liberty.

It is well to think well; it is divine to act well.

The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.

It is a monstrous thing that I will say, but I will say it all the same: I find in many things more restraint and order in my morals than in my opinions, and my lust less depraved than my reason.

Honesty is a good thing, but it is not profitable to its possessor unless it is kept under control.

I deserve respect for the things I did not do.

Perfection of moral virtue does not wholly take away the passions, but regulates them.

Temperance is moderation in the things that are good and total abstinence from the things that are foul.

In fact, it is a farce to call any being virtuous whose virtues do not result from the exercise of its own reason.

Laws control the lesser man. Right conduct controls the greater one.

As I heard out people who had done others wrong, I'd often wonder how a human allows his or her better judgement to override their conscience. When I share these feelings with my friends, they say, 'Everyone isn't like you.' But I think it's easy to assert your better feelings and not allow the darker side to dominate your personality.

It's better to die doing good than to live doing evil.

Integrity in the Moment of Choice: Quality of life depends on what happens in the space between stimulus and response.