Abraham Lincoln Quotes

The action is best that secures the greatest happiness for the greatest number.

It is the greatest good to the greatest number which is the measure of right and wrong.

The said truth is that it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.

The greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

I do not believe in the doctrine of the greatest good of the greatest number. The only real, dignified, human doctrine is the greatest good of all.

Priestly was the first (unless it was Becarria) who taught my lips to pronounce this sacred truth--that the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the foundation of morals and legislation.

That action is best which procures the greatest happiness for the greatest numbers.

To be a utilitarian means that you judge actions as right or wrong in accordance with whether they have good consequences. So you try to do what will have the best consequences for all of those affected.

Compliments of your Senator, Lyndon Baines Johnson—the greatest good for the greatest number.

Utilitarianism is a philosophy from the olden days exploring the idea that whatever is best for the majority is the fairest.

The highest proof of civility is that the whole public action of the State is directed on securing the greatest good of the greatest number.

The goal of maximizing the welfare of all may be better achieved by an ethic that accepts our inclinations and harnesses them so that, taken as a whole, the system works to everyone's advantage.

The end never justifies the means because there is no end; there are only means.

Upon the principles of reason, the good of many is preferable to the good of a few or of one; a lasting good is to be preferred before a temporary, the public before the private.

To believe in 'the greater good' is to operate, necessarily, in a certain ethical suspension.

The only objects of practical reason are therefore those of good and evil. For by the former is meant an object necessarily desired according to a principle of reason; by the latter one necessarily shunned, also according to a principle of reason.

Our object in the construction of the state is the greatest happiness of the whole, and not that of any one class.

No decisions should ever be made without asking the question, is this for the common good?

The purpose of government is to obtain the greatest quantity of human happiness.

The good of the people is the chief law.

The end of government is the good of mankind.

Mankind have, not only in their individual character, but in their collective capacity as nations, recognized and avowed in their opinions and actions, a system of laws calculated to produce the greatest happiness of the greatest number.

The supreme inspiration is the common weal.

There are only individual people, different individual people, with their own individual lives. Using one of these people for the benefit of others uses him and benefits the others. Nothing more. What happens is that something is done to him for the sake of others. Talk of an overall social good covers this up.