Peter Ustinov Quotes

I've learned a lot about good and evil. They are not always what they appear to be.

There are the good and bad and every morrally ambiguous shade in between.

The difference is too nice - Where ends the virtue or begins the vice.

I always end up taking people that are morally ambiguous.

My idea of what's good and bad and right and wrong is maybe greyer than most, and I like writing about that.

I've yet to meet a person in my life who doesn't have some moral ambiguity.

Men are more moral than they think and far more immoral than they can imagine.

There's no good guys and bad guys.

I don't believe in good people and bad people.

Our errors and our controversies, in the sphere of morality, arise sometimes from looking on men as though they could be altogether bad, or altogether good.

You can choose who you want to be the hero [in Hard Candy], but youll be second-guessing yourself -- theres just no right answer. Our society is obsessed with finding good and finding evil, but I think were all capable of anything.

If some incarnation of evil as unambiguous as Hitler appeared again, I would have no moral qualms about killing the enemy. But in the modern world of moral murkiness, I prefer to keep my hands as clean of enemy blood as possible.

I find it most remarkable that we who are so intimately involved in the battle between good and evil are even more involved with the shades of gray in between them.

You can't slice up morals.

Wickedness is always wickedness, but folly is not always folly.

In philosophy seminars, the choice is usually between good and evil. In the real world, however, the choice is often between a bad guy and a worse guy.

He kills people. Now I'm no expert, but doesn't that make you a bad person?" Jamie glared at Nick. "You've killed a lot more people than he has. What does that make you?" "Not a person," Nick murmured, not sounding particularly interested. "Surely you remember.

If you start out looking at somebody, wondering whether he's good or bad, I think you're starting out in the wrong direction. I think we're all good and we're all bad.

Reasonable and vicious are quite consistent with each other, in fact, only through their union are great and far-reaching crimes possible

Reality is much more complex than any judgment of right and wrong encourages you to believe. When you really understand the ethical, spiritual, social, economic, and psychological forces that shape individuals, you will see that people's choices are not based on a desire to hurt. Instead, they are in accord with what they know and what world views are available to them. Most are doing the best they can, given what information they've received and what problems they are facing.

The border between good and evil is terribly fuzzy.

Evil…doesn’t mean doing things that have bad consequences for people. It means private thoughts and actions that are not to “the Christian majority’s” private liking.

The 'expert' is the man who stays put.

In cases of this sort, let us say adultery, rightness and wrongness do not depend on committing it with the right woman at the right time and in the right manner, but the mere fact of committing such action at all is to do wrong.

There is no such thing as pure good or pure evil, least of all in people. In the best of us there are thoughts or deeds that are wicked, and in the worst of us, at least some virtue. An adversary is not one who does loathsome acts for their own sake. He always has a reason that to him is justification. My cat eats mice. Does that make him bad? I don't think so, and the cat doesn't think so, but I would bet the mice have a different opinion.