Confucius Quotes

There are three things against which the wise man guards: lust when young, quarrels when strong, and covetousness when old.

Temperance is love surrendering itself wholly to Him who is its object; courage is love bearing all things gladly for the sake of Him who is its object; justice is love serving only Him who is its object, and therefore rightly ruling; prudence is love making wise distinction between what hinders and what helps itself.

Every one of us ... knows better than he practices, and recognizes a better law than he obeys.

He cannot be vertuous that is not rigorous.

Cultivate these, then, for they are wholly within your power: sincerity and dignity; industriousness; and sobriety. Avoid grumbling, be frugal, considerate, and frank; be temperate in manner and speech; carry yourself with authority.

When you can't have anything else, you can have virtue.

Virtue - even attempted virtue - brings light; indulgence brings fog.

Virtue does not consist in the absence of the passions, but in the control of them.

Age in a virtuous person, of either sex, carries in it an authority which makes it preferable to all the pleasures of youth.

It is easy to be virtuous in prospective.

There are three things to beware of through life: when a man is young, let him beware of his appetites; when he is middle-aged, of his passions; and when old, of covetousness, especially.

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

There is no royal road or ready way to virtue.

True education seeks to make men and women not only good mathematicians, proficient linguists, profound scientists, or brilliant literary lights, but also honest men and women with virtue, temperance, and brotherly love.

The view that honesty is something, and even a virtue, belongs, it is true, to those private opinions which are forbidden in this age of public opinions.

Respect for self is the beginning of cultivating virtue in men and women.

In order to grow old, you have to experience everything, but in moderation.

Moral character has now some influence in our elections, but not that place which it deserves. The law of public opinion excludes confirmed sots, and persons judicially convicted of high crimes and misdemeanors against the State; but it ought to render the election of all profane swearers, notorious Sabbath breakers, seducers, slanderers, prodigals and riotous persons, as well as the advocates of dueling, impracticable.

Patience is a virtue; virtue is a grace.

Assume a virtue, if you have it not. That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat; Of habits devil, is angel yet in this.

Virtue is nothing but an act of loving that which is to be beloved, and that act is prudence, from whence not to be removed by constraint is fortitude; not to be allured by enticements is temperance; not to be diverted by pride is justice.

It is not enough merely possess virtue, as if it were an art; it should be practiced.

A good moral character is the first essential. It is highly important not only to be learned but to be virtuous.

You don't luck into integrity. You work at it.