Judith Viorst Quotes

It's just the way things are." she shrugged. "It's no one's fault." "Or everyone's.

Public emergencies may require the hand of severity to fall heavily on those who are not personally guilty, but compassion prompts, and ever urges to milder methods.

A problem is that if all of us are collectively responsible for a big world goal, then no single agency or politician is held accountable if the goal is not met. Collective responsibility for world goals works about as well as collective farms in agriculture, and for the same reason.

Collective crimes incriminate no one.

Forbear to lay the guilt of a few on the many.

The institutions of the European Union, and the states that belong to this union, each and every one, are paying the price of our failures, hesitations and contradictions. We should each ask ourselves how personally responsible we are.

One thing, however, is sure, - that in all cases the effort should be to impose all the cost of repairing the wrong upon the doer of the wrong. This alone is real justice, and of course such justice is necessarily free.

No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.

If you are serving justice to one person, those who have been affected should also be served some form of justice.

I don't have any gnawing guilt over contributing to any unhappiness suffered by my husbands. They were as much to blame as I was.

We know that we are not collectively guilty, so how can we accuse any other nation, no matter what some of its people have done, of being collectively guilty?

Reprisals are an exception to the general rule of equity, that an innocent person ought not to suffer for the guilty.

A decent society is not based on rights. It is based on duty. Our duty to one another. To all should be given opportunity; from all responsibility demanded.

Do not you know that people's sin fall upon the prince, and the prince's sin falls upon the people?

Because of a few, disasters come upon a whole people, and because of the evil deeds of one, many have to taste their fruits.

He who befriends a slayer is a slayer too.

Responsibility is a unique concept... You may share it with others, but your portion is not diminished. You may delegate it, but it is still with you...

We may not all be equally guilty. But we are all equally responsible for building a decent and just society.

If a whole team doesn't perform, you cannot pick one player especially and say, 'He doesn't do this or do that.'

If you are going to call out your teammates, you have to call out yourself, too. You can't just separate yourself from the rest, because if you are going to get 90 percent of the credit when you win, you have to be willing to take 90 percent of the blame when you lose.

Everyone fights for everyone else. If someone has a bad day, then the others are there for him. And if a player makes a mistake, then the others can compensate for that. Those sorts of things are crucial at this level, and it's really important that we perform as a unit.

All players have equal duties and merits and share the reward and sometimes the blame.

In tribal society, the most important thing to do when civilians are killed in a skirmish is to acknowledge the deaths, and provide compensation. When tribal clans fight, the victor is required to take care of the vanquished widows and orphans, which puts a limitation on bloodshed, and tempers warring groups to try and negotiate a compromise.

Sin with the multitude, and your responsibility and guilt are as great and as truly personal, as if you alone had done the wrong

It takes two to write a letter as much as it takes two to make a quarrel.