Joseph Brodsky Quotes

Everyone's constantly scrambling around trying to justify their own cruel behavior, trying to come up with psychological tricks to make themselves not feel bad.

Man can and does rationalize his sins. He finds reasons for all his weakness, invents excuses that first calm and then deaden his conscience. He blames God, society, education, and environment for his wrong doing.

When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.

One of the things I liked about playing Tony Gates in 'Line of Duty' was that I don't think he gave much thought to justifying his actions until he was under investigation.

An excuse is sometimes more ugly than guilt.

If someone has it inside them to commit an act, then that act would be committed anyway. It's very easy for someone to place the blame on something other than the person who committed the act. It's people looking for scapegoats, you know?

Even when we see somebody incredibly evil, there's a rationalization behind what they're doing. They're at their best when they're at the moment.

What most men call their conscience is imaginary virtue switching left or right according to self-interest.

Moving on' is a concept invented by Housewives. Housewives who behave so appallingly all they can do is say they are moving on, preferably in a place where everyone can hear them. To stay put and acknowledge that their actions have consequences and to accept responsibility is simply too painful for this particular brand of narcissist.

The Boogeyman is your conscience. The Boogeyman is the result of your own bad behavior. I love this Boogeyman.

An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie, for an excuse is a lie guarded.

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

I. Hate. Excuses. Excuses are a disease.

Is it really so difficult to tell a good action from a bad one? I think one usually knows right away or a moment afterward, in a horrid flash of regret.

Blame is just a lazy person's way of making sense of chaos.

Once you start lying, you get kind of comfortable. You start believing it. Especially if you truly believe you didn't really cheat because you were doing what everybody else was doing.

Like many people, I have a fascination with lies and the people who tell them. I wouldn't say I've never told a lie, but I don't think I've ever told one without both assuming I would be found out and feeling absolutely rotten about it.

No doubt, corporate CEOs who lie to their shareholders and politicians who lie to their public know and believe intellectually that lying is immoral. Why then do they lie? They lie to others because they first lie to themselves.

The price that one pays for refusing to act on the truth as one sees it, is to be led to believe untruth to avoid guilt.

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.

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

Men are only too clever at shifting blame from their own shoulders to those of others.

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

An excuse is the handy explanation we offer when we disappoint other people.

If you scapegoat someone, it's a third party that will be aware of it. It won't be you. Because you will believe you are doing the right thing.