Richard Bach Quotes

Each man must grant himself … the morality that suits him.

I don't think anybody is anybody else's moral compass.

The only possible ethic is to do what one wants to do.

I don't tend to think in terms of a moral authority - be a good boy, do good things - more in terms of what feels right.

It is not for me to enforce my morals on others.

I don't mean you disregard every rule of your community. I don't go around naked, for example. I don't run through red lights. The little things, I can obey. But the big things- how we think, what we value- those you must choose yourself. You can't let anyone-or any society- determine those for you. ' -Morrie Schwartz

I started with the belief that every person who came to the laboratory was free to accept or to reject the dictates of authority. This view sustains a conception of human dignity insofar as it sees in each man a capacity for choosing his own behavior. And as it turned out, many subjects did, indeed, choose to reject the experimenter's commands, providing a powerful affirmation of human ideals.

We are product of neither nature nor nurture; we are a product of choice, because there is always a space between stimulus and response. As we wisely exercise our power to choose based on principles, the space will become larger.

One might rationally argue that individual human beings should be free choose what moral behavior they approve of, and which they don't, subject to the constraints of the law.

Each man must grant himself the emotions that he needs and the morality that suits him.

I should have no use for a paradise in which I should be deprived of the right to prefer hell.

I have gained this from philosophy: that I do without being commanded what others do only from fear of the law.

One cannot prescribe to anyone whether he should follow an ethic of absolute ends or an ethic of responsibility.

If a man's free will to adopt ideas and values is inalienable, his freedom of action - his freedom to put these ideas into effect in the world - is not in such a fortunate condition.

The problem, of course, was that people did not seem to understand the difference between right and wrong. They needed to be reminded about this, because if you left it to them to work out for themselves, they would never bother. They would just find out what was best for them, and then they would call that the right thing. That's how most people thought.

Choice is the essence of ethics: if there were no choice there would be no ethics, no good, no evil; good and evil have meaning only insofar as man is free to choose.

No enduring improvement can occur without righteous exercise of agency. Do not attempt to override agency. The Lord himself would not do that. Forced obedience yields no blessings.

People have been raised in a morality that says, "If it feels all right for you, it's probably OK."

We decide what is right. Never mind what the people think.

In the space between stimulus (what happens) and how we respond, lies our freedom to choose. Ultimately, this power to choose is what defines us as human beings. We may have limited choices but we can always choose. We can choose our thoughts, emotions, moods, our words, our actions; we can choose our values and live by principles. It is the choice of acting or being acted upon.

In the state of nature, wrong-doing is impossible; or, if anyone does wrong, it is to himself, not to another. For no one by the law of nature is bound to please another, unless he chooses, nor to hold anything to be good or evil, but what he himself, according to his own temperament, pronounces to be so; and, to speak generally, nothing is forbidden by the law of nature, except what is beyond everyone's power.

Man has a choice and it's a choice that makes him a man.

To choose evil is to choose freedom, emancipation from all restraint.

As long as you're not hurting anyone, your choices are your choices.

If he wants to be an asshole, it's a free country. Millions before him have made the same life choice.