Nick Hornby Quotes

In the common run of mankind, for one that is wise and good you find ten of a contrary character.

Human beings can be awful cruel to one another.

Moral philosophy is nothing else but the science of what is good, and evil, in the conversation, and society of mankind. Good, and evil, are names that signify our appetites, and aversions; which in different tempers, customs, and doctrines of men, are different.

It is not human to be without shame and without desire.

I don't believe that we evolved moral psychology; it just doesn't seem plausible to me as a biological phenomenon.

Human beings have a vested interest in being trustworthy.

It is not because men's desires are strong that they act ill; it is because their consciences are weak.

When, in the present world, men behave well, that is no doubt sometimes because they are creatures of habit as well as, sometimes, because they are reasonable.

Right is right, and wrong is wrong, and a body ain’t got no business doing wrong when he ain’t ignorant and knows better.

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.

Nature doesn't cheat - people do.

You weren't a decent man and you didn't do your best. We none of us were and none of us did.

Humans are not really very humane.

Every man prefers virtue, when there is not some strong incitement to transgress its precepts.

Good people will do good things, lots of them, because they are good people. They will do bad things because they are human.

Man perfected by society is the best of all animals; he is the most terrible of all when he lives without law, and without justice.

Person-to-person, most people are honest.

Morality represents for everybody a thoroughly definite and ascertained idea: the idea of human conduct regulated in a certain manner.

A man needs a private life. With no ability to have a private life, one thing leads to another, and before you know it we have Bill and Monica. We need to get real about things. Humans are humans. Why should we expect more?

As to modesty and decency, if we are simians we have done well, considering: but if we are something else-fallen angels-we have indeed fallen far.

All human beings search for either reasons to be good, or excuses to be bad.

The very essence of our civilization is that we give a paramount place to morality in all our affairs, public or private.

If you ask anyone, what is morality based on? These are the two factors that always come out: One is reciprocity, … a sense of fairness, and the other one is empathy and compassion.

Man is born for uprightness. If a man lose his uprightness and yet live, his escape from death is mere good fortune.

The absence of vices adds so little to the sum of one's virtues.