John Lanchester Quotes

You make a deal. You figure out how much sin you can live with.

So far as he is able, a prince should stick to the path of good but, if the necessity arises, he should know how to follow evil.

Do not let us mistake necessary evils for good.

Ferris: Are you going to be as impractical as that? Rearden: The evaluation of an action as practical, Dr. Ferris, depends on what it is that one wishes to practice. Ferris: Haven't you always placed your self-interest above all else? Rearden: That is what I am doing right now.

If suicide is allowed then everything is allowed. If anything is not allowed then suicide is not allowed. This throws a light on the nature of ethics, for suicide is, so to speak, the elementary sin. And when one investigates it it is like investigating mercury vapour in order to comprehend the nature of vapours.

Rose, I cheat at cards and buy liquor for minors. But I would never, ever force you into something you don't want.

My father wasn't much for show business. He was an insurance man - very well-liked, very warm. He had a lot of friends.

Man's sense of Morality tends to decrease as his Power increases

Morality is a luxury we can't afford out here. There's no right or wrong, just survival or death.

Many a man would have turned rogue if he knew how.

The politician has no more use for pride than Falstaff had for honour.

It was wrong. But it was worth it.

The last degree of honesty has always been, and is still considered incompatible with statesmanship. To hunger and thirst after righteousness has been naturally, as it were, supposed a disqualification for affairs.

How long had he been doing what was necessary instead of what was right? In a fair world they would be one and the same.

The Moral Sense teaches us what is right, and how to avoid it-when unpopular.

The third rule of ethics of means and ends is that in war the end justifies almost any means.

I wouldn't want to manufacture cigarettes. But if I owned - we do own Costco. Do they sell them? Yes. So I don't have a problem owning stock in that. But I just wouldn't want to - I wouldn't want to do it myself. I basically think, if anything is sufficiently antisocial, society should do something about it. But that's a separate question. But - and I don't think there's any company that I have seen that's 100 percent pure.

There are worse things than a lie... I have found... that it may be well to choose one sin in order that another may be shunned.

Have you no morals, man?' 'Can't afford them,Governor.

Having been unable to strengthen justice, we have justified strength.

The conscience is the most flexible material in the world. Today you cannot stretch it over a mole hill; while tomorrow it can hide a mountain.

There's not a single thing on offer in this all-too-temporary world for which you should ever sell your soul.

What passes in the world for talent or dexterity or enterprise is often only a want of moral principle. We may succeed where others fail, not from a greater share of invention, but from not being nice in the choice of expedients.

I believe the moral losses of expediency always far outweigh the temporary gains.

Revolting means for good ends make the ends of themselves revolting.