Daniel Patrick Moynihan Quotes

Decency is the least of all laws, but yet it is the law which is most strictly observed.

Honor to a Spaniard, no matter how dishonest, is as real a thing as water, wine, or olive oil. There is honor among pickpockets and honor among whores. It is simply that the standards differ.

Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long as possible with the trousers of decorum.

The most practical kind of politics is the politics of decency.

Purity is the feminine, truth the masculine of honor.

The more elegance the less virtue in all times and countries.

There are necessary taboos and essential decencies in every morally healthy society.

The more Mr. Trump traduces the old established lines of decency, the more he affirms his supporters' most shameless ideological instincts.

And die with decency.

Observe decorum, and it will open a path to morality.

America does not want vulgarity and sexual exploitation to be our values and we do not want the world to think those are our standards. We want to be a better nation and a better people, with better standards.

Honor sinks where commerce long prevails.

Nothing is less important than which fork you use. Etiquette is the science of living. It embraces everything. It is ethics. It is honor.

If someone lacked decency or respect, I didn't allow that person to stay in my world.

Morals are private. Decency is public.

I value peace when it is not bought at the price of fundamental decencies.

Honour sinks where commerce long prevails.

If honor were profitable, everybody would be honorable.

What is called for is dignity. We need to set an example.

Even in this glowering age, morality animates our lives with meaning.

I don't think it would be dignified.

Better deserve honor and not have it, than have it and not deserve it.

[Benjamin Franklin's life was:] ... one continued insult to good manners and decency.

Justice consists in doing no injury to men; decency in giving them no offence.

Sir, the gentleman soils the spot he stands on.