Mary McCarthy Quotes

It's hard to regret making the choice that you think is right.

I know I've done good things, I know I've done bad things.

I find that people... very few people think that what they're doing is bad, and usually the people who think what they're doing is bad it has more to do with guilt.

Conscience: something that feels terrible when everything else feels well.

My role in Palin is something that there's not a day that has gone by that I don't have regret about.

A guilty conscience means at least you have one.

I never did anything I'm really ashamed of.

Guilt is the price we pay willingly for doing what we are going to do anyway.

Conscience is a coward, and those faults it has not strength enough to prevent it seldom has justice enough to accuse.

You cannot do wrong and feel right. It is impossible!

One lives with so many bad deeds on one's conscience and some good intentions in one's heart.

Begin thus from the first act, and proceed; and, in conclusion, at the ill which thou hast done, be troubled, and rejoice for the good.

Now I come to 75 years of age, I think what's most important in life is your conscience. If you told a lie and made other people suffer, I think that's very difficult when you reach this age.

I'm just going to say it: I'm pro-guilt. Guilt is good. Guilt helps us stay on track because it's about our behavior. It occurs when we compare something we've done - or failed to do - with our personal values.

Hard though it may be to accept, remember that guilt is sometimes a friendly internal voice reminding you that you're messing up.

Conscience allows us to do two things: Pass judgment on ourselves; approve or condemn our own conduct.

If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience.

Perhaps it is better to be irresponsible and right than to be responsible and wrong.

The idea of 'breaking bad' and what that means in terms of the actions and decisions people make, and why they make them - it makes people question themselves in the 'What would I do?' kind of way.

All sin and all crime comes from the same thing: 'I decided. I decided this was okay.'

Right is what you should do, wrong is what you really want to do.

I continually ask myself if a decision I'm about to make falls short in the eyes of God or my family or my colleagues. It's actually a pretty simple litmus test: am I doing the right thing or not? The answer is generally an easy one.

For my part, I believe that remorse is the least active of all a man's moral senses,--the very easiest to be deadened when wakened, and in some never wakened at all.

You have to decide at the end of the day if you can live with yourself.

Prudence reproaches; conscience accuses.