goodness

Link	Quote	Tags	Author
e1dc247	People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered. Love them anyway. If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Do good anyway. If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable. Be honest and frank anyway. The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds. Think big anyway. People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs. Fight for a few underdogs anyway. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. People really need help but may attack you if you do help them. Help people anyway. Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth. Give the world the best you have anyway.	world kindness goodness honesty happiness misattributed-to-mother-teresa	Kent M. Keith
9bcc8ad	When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it--always.	goodness sadness love truth inspirational victory despair evil	Mahatma Gandhi
325a29f	It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.	lies goodness wisdom delusion self-deception	Leo Tolstoy
61290d9	Be the reason someone smiles. Be the reason someone feels loved and believes in the goodness in people.	being-human humanism kindness human humanity goodness inspiration inspirational-attitude inspirational-life inspirational-quotes inspire life-and-living life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking life-lessons optimism life love inspirational inspirational-quote smiles life-philosophy smile human-nature	Roy T. Bennett
13754ad	Life becomes easier and more beautiful when we can see the good in other people.	kindness goodness inspiration inspirational-quotes inspire life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking optimism life inspirational	Roy T. Bennett
29668f7	How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.	light world humanity goodness life inspirational good-deeds	William Shakespeare
ba4425c	I want to live my life in such a way that when I get out of bed in the morning, the devil says, "aw shit, he's up!	live goodness motivational life inspirational aspirations morning purpose devil	Steve Maraboli
ce8222b	Good people see the good and bring out the best in other people.	goodness leadership inspiration inspirational-attitude inspirational-life inspirational-quotes inspire life-and-living life-quotes living motivation optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking motivational life-lessons optimism life inspirational leader	Roy T. Bennett
59337d6	Conquer the angry one by not getting angry; conquer the wicked by goodness; conquer the stingy by generosity, and the liar by speaking the truth	kindness goodness love truth wisdom inspirational generosity anger knowledge	Siddh?rtha Gautama
40c6251	When someone has been mean to you, why would you want to be good to them?' 'You wouldn't want to. That's what makes it hard. You do it anyway. Being good is hard. Much harder than being bad.	war goodness books-of-ember lina right-choices city-of-ember jeanne-duprau people-of-sparks peace	Jeanne DuPrau
b02dcb9	"What a lovely thing a rose is!" He walked past the couch to the open window and held up the drooping stalk of a moss-rose, looking down at the dainty blend of crimson and green. It was a new phase of his character to me, for I had never before seen him show any keen interest in natural objects. "There is nothing in which deduction is so necessary as religion," said he, leaning with his back against the shutters. "It can be built up as an exact science by the reasoner. Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers, our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existence in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers."	nature goodness reason religion hope roses providence flowers	Arthur Conan Doyle
7c20156	Don't go on discussing what a good person should be. Just be one.	goodness wisdom inspirational self-actualization being	Marcus Aurelius
c028bc7	Simple, genuine goodness is the best capital to found the business of this life upon. It lasts when fame and money fail, and is the only riches we can take out of this world with us.	money goodness honesty riches fame honor	Louisa May Alcott
da39a3e		nature quailty freedom goodness choice beauty inspiration science darkness motivational hope intelligence life inspirational marie-lu intimate american-dream dedication watchmen meaning-of-life order hardship pure harmony evil	Terry Pratchett
4502aac	Real courage is doing the right thing when nobody's looking. Doing the unpopular thing because it's what you believe, and the heck with everybody.	unsung-heroes courage goodness character inspirational moral-courage	Justin Cronin
87d573b	Goodness, real goodness, has it's own sort of cruelty to it.	goodness jem	Cassandra Clare
b3f935c	Do not act as if you had ten thousand years to throw away. Death stands at your elbow. Be good for something while you live and it is in your power.	goodness death inspirational charity help	Marcus Aurelius
7ff7a12	There are two things that men should never weary of, goodness and humility; we get none too much of them in this rough world among cold, proud people.	goodness inspirational humility	Robert Louis Stevenson
a3b4d36	I admire those who do good and expect nothing in return.	kindness goodness inspiration inspirational-quotes inspire life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking optimism life inspirational	Roy T. Bennett
8700d32	We don't need to be good. But let's try to be fair.	goodness	Holly Black
8aab33e	I will think of you every time I need to be reminded that there is beauty and goodness in the world.	goodness	Arthur Golden
c31b522	If goodness has causes, it is not goodness; if it has effects, a reward, it is not goodness either. So goodness is outside the chain of cause and effect.	goodness religion	Leo Tolstoy
10f5885	If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes' palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own instructions: I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.	goodness good-intentions	William Shakespeare
b8c41cb	God will never disappoint us... If deep in our hearts we suspect that God does not love us and cannot manage our affairs as well as we can, we certainly will not submit to His discipline. ...To the unbeliever the fact of suffering only convinces him that God is not to be trusted, does not love us. To the believer, the opposite is true.	pain suffering goodness trust	Elisabeth Elliot
63e66b4	How good life is when one does something good and just!	kindness goodness justice	Fyodor Dostoyevsky
614d0c3	There are those who do not hold that there is any innate goodness to mankind. To them I say, had you lived my life, you would not believe it. I have known the depths to which mortals are capable of descending, and I have seen the heights. I have seen how kindness and compassion may grow in the unlikeliest of places, as the mountain flower forces its way through the stern rock.	kindness goodness kushiels-dart jacqueline-carey	Jacqueline Carey
b6ad4d5	" was a great man. a wonderful intellect, a great soul of matchless courage, one of the great men of the earth -- and yet we have no right to bow down to his memory simply because he was great. Great orators, great soldiers, great lawyers, often use their gifts for a most unholy cause. We meet to pay a tribute of love and respect to because he used his matchless power for the good of man.	good courage goodness love ingersoll robert-g-ingersoll robert-green-ingersoll robert-ingersoll eulogy praise greatness tribute respect honor power memory	Clarence Darrow
3fa82cc	I guess when you're trying to find all the parts of yourself, it's difficult to be with someone who's already fully intact.	goodness inspiration love yourself	Cecelia Ahern
e3f2d2c	And this is the eternal law. For, Evil often stops short at istelf and dies with the doer of it! but Good, never.	goodness	Charles Dickens
14f8cf3	But with your life you make a few bad decisions, get unlucky a few times, whatever, but you have to keep going, right?	moving-on letting-go goodness inspiration life love	Cecelia Ahern
069b726	It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers.	goodness hope inspirational blessings sherlock-holmes flowers	Arthur Conan Doyle
ab43927	The danger in trying to do good is that the mind comes to confuse the intent of goodness with the act of doing things well.	goodness	Ursula K. Le Guin
f30eefc	"Everybody's got the seam of goodness in them, Kit," said Grandpa. "Just a matter of whether it can be found and brought out into the light."	light goodness kit-s-wilderness seam	David Almond
34167bf	Some boys walk by and you cry, seeing them. They feel good, they look good, they are good. Oh, they're not above peeing off a bridge, or stealing an occasional dime-store pencil sharpener; it's not that. It's just, you know, seeing them pass, that's how they'll be all their life; they'll get hit, hurt, cut, bruised, and always wonder why, why does it happen? how can it happen to	pain good goodness people-will-hurt-you hurt cry description innocence vulnerable sad	Ray Bradbury
cfb17e9	Every man had his personal habits, passions, and impulses toward goodness, beauty, and truth.	goodness truth	Leo Tolstoy
53dda56	But the scent of the good is blown against the wind: A good man perfumes all directions.	goodness v-54	Anonymous
8350691	Goodness works in mysterious ways. Even in the deepest dark, you'll find a light to shine your way through.	light goodness shine-your-light evil	Melissa de la Cruz
c6d54e6	The evil done by men of goodwill is the worst of all ... We have done terrible things, for the best of reasons, and that makes it worse.	goodness	Iain Pears
b8723a2	Oh! if the good hearts had the fat purses, how much better everything would go!	wealth goodness giving les-misérables	Victor Hugo
e6c6846	{ } heart was fathomlessly deep, long acquainted with humility, patience, sacrifice. His little home amid the roses was austerely simple; he knew the worthlessness of luxury, the joy of few possessions. The modesty with which he wore his scientific fame repeatedly reminded me of the trees that bend low with the burden of ripening fruits; it is the barren tree that lifts its head high in an empty boast. I was in New York when, in 1926, my dear passed away. In tears I thought, 'Oh, I would gladly walk all the way from here to Santa Rosa for one more glimpse of him!' Locking myself away from secretaries and visitors, I spent the next twenty-four hours in seclusion... name has now passed into the heritage of common speech. Listing 'burbank' as a transitive verb, Webster's New International Dictionary defines it: 'To cross or graft (a plant). Hence, figuratively, to improve (anything, as a process or institution) by selecting good features and rejecting bad, or by adding good features.' 'Beloved ,' I cried after reading the definition, 'your very name is now a synonym for goodness!	mourning grief joy goodness death sadness science friendship love burbank luther-burbank brotherhood modesty new-york	Paramahansa Yogananda
6a2b7e3	Only God may be adored, because only God is unlimited goodness, truth, and beauty, and thus only God deserves unlimited love.	christianity goodness beauty spirituality god love philosophy truth inspirational unlimited-beauty unlimited-goodness unlimited-love unlimited-truth jesus-shock catholicism theology	Peter Kreeft
89b3c74	The evil in the world must not make me doubt the existence of God. There could be no evil if there were no God. Before there can be a hole in a uniform, there must be a uniform; before there is death, there must be life; before there is error, there must be truth; before there is a crime, there must be liberty and law; before there is a war, there must be peace; before there is a devil, there must be a God, rebellion against whom made the devil.	goodness god the-devil evil	Fulton J. Sheen
179bbfd	I know that people can be better than they are. We are capable of bearing a great burden, once we discover that the burden is reality and arrive where reality is.	people goodness self-awareness reality life	James Baldwin
5c37262	I saw the truth, I saw and I know that people can be beautiful and happy without losing the ability to live on earth. I will not and cannot believe that evil is the normal condition of people.	good-and-evil goodness truth	Fyodor Dostoyevsky
b29bc9f	The road to happiness is paved with good deeds for others.	people goodness happiness life road-to-happiness purpose	Lisa Schroeder
0c9d3b6	It is the good children, Madame, who make the most terrible revolutionaries. They say nothing, they do not hide under the table, they eat only one sweet at a time, but later on, they make Society pay dearly for it!	revenge goodness good-behaviour payback manners revolution	Jean-Paul Sartre
8a068eb	"But how nice it would be to know that some good Yankee woman - And there must be SOME good Yankee women. I don't care what people say, they can't all be bad! How nice it would be to know that they pulled weeds off our men's graves and brought flowers to them, even if they were enemies. If Charlie were dead in the North it would comfort me to know that someone - And I don't care what you ladies think of me," her voice broke again, "I will withdraw from both clubs and I'll -- I'll pull up every weed off every Yankee's grave I can find and I'll plant flowers, too -- and -- I just dare anyone to stop me!"	humanity goodness gone-with-the-wind graves	Margaret Mitchell
21ede7f	It isn't hard to find evil in this world. Evil is always more easily imagined than good, somehow.	good goodness evil	Gregory Maguire
f44e8f9	They constantly try to escape From the darkness outside and within By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good. But the man that is will shadow The man that pretends to be.	perfection escape goodness system shadow utopia	T.S. Eliot
61e2a6e	I mind how I said to you once that there is a price for being good the same as for being bad; a cost to pay. And it's the good men that cant deny the bill when it comes around. They cant deny it for the reason that there aint any way to make them pay it, like a honest man that gambles. The bad men can deny it; that's why dont anybody expect them to pay on sight or any other time. But the good cant. Maybe it takes longer to pay for being good than for being bad.	goodness price	William Faulkner
25c8f8c	Il n'est si homme de bien, qu'il mette a l'examen des loix toutes ses actions et pensees, qui ne soit pendable dix fois en sa vie. (There is no man so good that if he placed all his actions and thoughts under the scrutiny of the laws, he would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.)	thoughts goodness privacy laws guilt	Michel de Montaigne
0afaa3c	God is Infinite Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness - and LOVE; but if this idea is too vast for your human faculties - if your mind loses itself in its overwhelming infinitude, fix it on Him who condescended to take our nature upon Him, who was raised to Heaven even in His glorified human body, in whom the fulness of the Godhead shines.	goodness love wisdom jesus-christ power	Anne Brontë
4be3bc9	Some people are naturally good, you know, and others are not. I'm one of the others.	people goodness self-realization	L.M. Montgomery
d4d4c3d	But, brothers, this biting of their toe-nails over what is the cause of badness is what turns me into a fine laughing malchick. They don't go into what is the cause of goodness, so why the other shop? If lewdies are good that's because they like it, and I wouldn't ever interfere with their pleasures, and so of the other shop. And I was patronizing the other shop. More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me or our oddy knockies, and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning tbey of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. And is not our modern history, my brothers, the story of brave malenky selves fighting these big machines? I am serious with you brothers, over this. But what I do I do because I like to do.	goodness choice cause evil	Anthony Burgess
3195c4a	"We want them to see their home planet," Mrs. Whatsit said. The Medium lost the delighted smile she had worn till then. "Oh, why must you make me look at unpleasant things when there are so many delightful ones to see?" Again Mrs. Which's voice reverberated through the cave. "There will no longer be so many pleasant things to look at if responsible people do not do something about the unpleasant ones."	goodness truth standing-up-for-what-is-right	Madeleine L'Engle
ea73fdd	People won't admit it, they're too busy grabbing to see that the lights have fused. They can't see the darkness and the spider-face beyond and the great web of it all. That there's always this if you scratch at the surface of happiness and goodness. The black and the black and the black.	happy good dark people goodness darkness happiness fused grab grabbing scratch spider lights beyond web distraction see black surface distracted	John Fowles
bd730a0	These are illusions of popular history which successful religion must promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumpths; a good deed is its own rewards; any bad human can be reformed; religious talismans protect one from demon possession; only females understand the ancient mysteries; the rich are doomed to unhappiness	virtue history good morality goodness faith religion religious belief-systems dune-arrakis dune-house-atreides evil-men falsehoods justice-of-god dune-messiah dune moral-law religion-philosophy falsehood historical-perspective history-of-thought history-of-mankind belief-system religion-spirituality religious-faith historical beliefs religions moral virtues morals evil	Frank Herbert
79f1f84	Look, Miranda, he said, those twenty long years that lie between you and me. I've more knowledge of life than you, I've lived more and betrayed more and seen more betrayed. At your age one is bursting with ideals. You think that because I can sometimes see what's trivial and what's important in art that I ought to be more virtuous. But I don't want to be virtuous. My charm (if there is any) for you is simply frankness. And experience. Not goodness. I'm not a good man. Perhaps morally I'm younger even than you are. Can you understand that?	virtue good goodness life betrayed bursting younger older trivial ideals virtuous years frank old frankness betray important understand ideal experience charm knowledge betrayal young	John Fowles
d8b2513	Oh God, it is amazing that men can talk so much about man's creaturely power and goodness, when, if thou didst not hold us back every moment, we should be devils incar nate.	men goodness god	Arthur Bennett
a5b2acf	It is not easy to explain why God permits evil; but it is impossible for an atheist to explain the existence of goodness. How could a spiritless, soul-less, cross-less, Godless universe become the center of faith, purity, sacrifice, and martyrdom? How can decency be the decent thing if there is no God? Since God is love, why should we be surprised that want of it should end in pain, hate, broken hearts, and war?	morality goodness god	Fulton J. Sheen
6524b69	In short, all good things are wild and free.	goodness tameness wildness	Henry David Thoreau
d55c635	If there is any good in life, in history, in my own past, I invoke it now. I invoke it with all the passion with which I have lived.	history passion goodness past life	Elizabeth Kostova
ea7d21d	I have always known that the best of the Saracens could out-Christian many of us Christians.	equality goodness religion crusades openmindedness tolerance	Ellis Peters
b769e90	Benevolence is often very peremptory.	goodness	W. Somerset Maugham
8d87e65	Oh, Gerty, I wasn't meant to be good.	goodness gerty-farish lily-bart the-house-of-mirth reputation	Edith Wharton
df04fd7	"Six years previously, Miss Brodie had led her new class into the garden for a history lesson underneath the big elm. On the way through the school corridors they passed the headmistress's study. The door was wide open, the room was empty. 'Little girls,' said Miss Brodie, 'come and observe this.' They clustered round the open door while she pointed to a large poster pinned with drawing-pins on the opposite wall within the room. It depicted a man's big face. Underneath were the words 'Safety First'. 'This is Stanley Baldwin who got in as Prime Minister and got out again ere long,' said Miss Brodie. 'Miss Mackay retains him on the wall because she believes in the slogan "Safety First". But Safety does not come first. Goodness, Truth and Beauty come first. Follow me."	goodness truth girls teacher safety	Muriel Spark
70dc658	The death of God has set the angels free. And they are terrible. There are principalities and powers. Angels are the thoughts of God. Now he had been dissolved into his thoughts which are beyond our conception in their nature and their multiplicity and their power. God was at least the name of something which we thought was good. Now even the name has gone and the spiritual world is scattered. There is nothing any more to prevent the magnetism of many spirits.	goodness god	Iris Murdoch
5f02187	"Whoever infringes upon individual 'charity,'" I began, "infringes upon man's nature and scorns his personal dignity. But the organizing of 'social charity' and the question of personal freedom are two different questions and are not mutually exclusive. Individual goodness will always abide, because it is a personal need, a living need for the direct influence of one person on another. ... In sowing your seed, in sowing your 'charity,' your good deed in whatever form it takes, you give away part of your person and receive into yourself part of another's; you mutually commune in each other; a little more attention, and you will be rewarded with knowledge, with the most unexpected discoveries. You will be bound, finally, to look at your work as a science; it will take in the whole of your life and maybe fill the whole of it. On the other hand, all your thoughts, all the seeds you have sown, which you may already have forgotten, will take on flesh and grow; what was received from you will be passed on to someone else. And how do you know what share you will have in the future outcome of human destiny? And if the knowledge and the whole life of this work finally raises you so high that you are able to plant a tremendous seed, to bequeath a tremendous thought to mankind, then..."	goodness	Fyodor Dostoyevsky
a0c2338	"The Church makes no man less free than he was before. But we chiefly value freedom in order to give it away; every man who loves surrenders his freedom, whether his passion be the love of a woman, the love of a cause, or the love of God. . . Hence: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Everyone wants the things that only a love of God will bring to him, but most men today seek them in the wrong places. That is why no one comes to God without a revolution of the spirit; he must stop seeking his good in Godlessness."	goodness love godlessness	Fulton J. Sheen
a02e1ea	[In the story of the Good Samaritan,] everybody knows the robber is bad--but doesn't Jesus also imply an indictment on the priest and Levite? . . . The priest and Levite are over here. They are 'righteous' in a superficial way. They don't rob anybody. They're not like that lousy criminal who is over here, on the bad end of the line. Do you see it? That's the line we modern Christians try to live on the right end of it . . . The Samaritan traveler lives on a higher level, altogether. The issue isn't who is wrong or righteous; that's obvious. The issue is who is truly good.	righteousness goodness righteous	Brian D. McLaren
60ef4fe	To be truly good means more than not robbing people . . . To be truly good means more than being righteously religious . . . To be truly good means being a good neighbor. . . . And to be a good neighbor means recognizing that there are ultimately no strangers. . . . Everybody is my neighbor! . . . Everybody is my brother! . . . There are no isolated monads wounded on the other side of the street! . . . We're all connected.	righteousness goodness neighbor good-samaritan	Brian D. McLaren
c933d19	...she thought of him as a person who did not have a normal spine, but had instead, a firm reed of goodness.	morality goodness	Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
9101910	He has written about equality, the perfectibility of human nature, and the essential goodness of mankind for many years -- he judges others by himself, poor soul.	goodness judgment human-nature	Patrick O'Brian

e1dc247

People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered. Love them anyway. If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Do good anyway. If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable. Be honest and frank anyway. The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds. Think big anyway. People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs. Fight for a few underdogs anyway. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. People really need help but may attack you if you do help them. Help people anyway. Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth. Give the world the best you have anyway.

world kindness goodness honesty happiness misattributed-to-mother-teresa

Kent M. Keith

9bcc8ad

When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it--always.

goodness sadness love truth inspirational victory despair evil

Mahatma Gandhi

325a29f

It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.

lies goodness wisdom delusion self-deception

Leo Tolstoy

61290d9

Be the reason someone smiles. Be the reason someone feels loved and believes in the goodness in people.

being-human humanism kindness human humanity goodness inspiration inspirational-attitude inspirational-life inspirational-quotes inspire life-and-living life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking life-lessons optimism life love inspirational inspirational-quote smiles life-philosophy smile human-nature

Roy T. Bennett

13754ad

Life becomes easier and more beautiful when we can see the good in other people.

kindness goodness inspiration inspirational-quotes inspire life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking optimism life inspirational

Roy T. Bennett

29668f7

How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.

light world humanity goodness life inspirational good-deeds

William Shakespeare

ba4425c

I want to live my life in such a way that when I get out of bed in the morning, the devil says, "aw shit, he's up!

live goodness motivational life inspirational aspirations morning purpose devil

Steve Maraboli

ce8222b

Good people see the good and bring out the best in other people.

goodness leadership inspiration inspirational-attitude inspirational-life inspirational-quotes inspire life-and-living life-quotes living motivation optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking motivational life-lessons optimism life inspirational leader

Roy T. Bennett

59337d6

Conquer the angry one by not getting angry; conquer the wicked by goodness; conquer the stingy by generosity, and the liar by speaking the truth

kindness goodness love truth wisdom inspirational generosity anger knowledge

Siddh?rtha Gautama

40c6251

When someone has been mean to you, why would you want to be good to them?' 'You wouldn't want to. That's what makes it hard. You do it anyway. Being good is hard. Much harder than being bad.

war goodness books-of-ember lina right-choices city-of-ember jeanne-duprau people-of-sparks peace

Jeanne DuPrau

b02dcb9

"What a lovely thing a rose is!" He walked past the couch to the open window and held up the drooping stalk of a moss-rose, looking down at the dainty blend of crimson and green. It was a new phase of his character to me, for I had never before seen him show any keen interest in natural objects. "There is nothing in which deduction is so necessary as religion," said he, leaning with his back against the shutters. "It can be built up as an exact science by the reasoner. Our highest assurance of the goodness of Providence seems to me to rest in the flowers. All other things, our powers, our desires, our food, are all really necessary for our existence in the first instance. But this rose is an extra. Its smell and its color are an embellishment of life, not a condition of it. It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers."

nature goodness reason religion hope roses providence flowers

Arthur Conan Doyle

7c20156

Don't go on discussing what a good person should be. Just be one.

goodness wisdom inspirational self-actualization being

Marcus Aurelius

c028bc7

Simple, genuine goodness is the best capital to found the business of this life upon. It lasts when fame and money fail, and is the only riches we can take out of this world with us.

money goodness honesty riches fame honor

Louisa May Alcott

da39a3e

nature quailty freedom goodness choice beauty inspiration science darkness motivational hope intelligence life inspirational marie-lu intimate american-dream dedication watchmen meaning-of-life order hardship pure harmony evil

Terry Pratchett

4502aac

Real courage is doing the right thing when nobody's looking. Doing the unpopular thing because it's what you believe, and the heck with everybody.

unsung-heroes courage goodness character inspirational moral-courage

Justin Cronin

87d573b

Goodness, real goodness, has it's own sort of cruelty to it.

goodness jem

Cassandra Clare

b3f935c

Do not act as if you had ten thousand years to throw away. Death stands at your elbow. Be good for something while you live and it is in your power.

goodness death inspirational charity help

Marcus Aurelius

7ff7a12

There are two things that men should never weary of, goodness and humility; we get none too much of them in this rough world among cold, proud people.

goodness inspirational humility

Robert Louis Stevenson

a3b4d36

I admire those who do good and expect nothing in return.

kindness goodness inspiration inspirational-quotes inspire life-quotes living optimistic positive-affirmation positive-life inspiring positive positive-thinking optimism life inspirational

Roy T. Bennett

8700d32

We don't need to be good. But let's try to be fair.

goodness

Holly Black

8aab33e

I will think of you every time I need to be reminded that there is beauty and goodness in the world.

goodness

Arthur Golden

c31b522

If goodness has causes, it is not goodness; if it has effects, a reward, it is not goodness either. So goodness is outside the chain of cause and effect.

goodness religion

Leo Tolstoy

10f5885

If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes' palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own instructions: I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.

goodness good-intentions

William Shakespeare

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God will never disappoint us... If deep in our hearts we suspect that God does not love us and cannot manage our affairs as well as we can, we certainly will not submit to His discipline. ...To the unbeliever the fact of suffering only convinces him that God is not to be trusted, does not love us. To the believer, the opposite is true.

pain suffering goodness trust

Elisabeth Elliot

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How good life is when one does something good and just!

kindness goodness justice

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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There are those who do not hold that there is any innate goodness to mankind. To them I say, had you lived my life, you would not believe it. I have known the depths to which mortals are capable of descending, and I have seen the heights. I have seen how kindness and compassion may grow in the unlikeliest of places, as the mountain flower forces its way through the stern rock.

kindness goodness kushiels-dart jacqueline-carey

Jacqueline Carey

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" was a great man. a wonderful intellect, a great soul of matchless courage, one of the great men of the earth -- and yet we have no right to bow down to his memory simply because he was great. Great orators, great soldiers, great lawyers, often use their gifts for a most unholy cause. We meet to pay a tribute of love and respect to because he used his matchless power for the good of man.

good courage goodness love ingersoll robert-g-ingersoll robert-green-ingersoll robert-ingersoll eulogy praise greatness tribute respect honor power memory

Clarence Darrow

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I guess when you're trying to find all the parts of yourself, it's difficult to be with someone who's already fully intact.

goodness inspiration love yourself

Cecelia Ahern

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And this is the eternal law. For, Evil often stops short at istelf and dies with the doer of it! but Good, never.

goodness

Charles Dickens

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But with your life you make a few bad decisions, get unlucky a few times, whatever, but you have to keep going, right?

moving-on letting-go goodness inspiration life love

Cecelia Ahern

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It is only goodness which gives extras, and so I say again that we have much to hope from the flowers.

goodness hope inspirational blessings sherlock-holmes flowers

Arthur Conan Doyle

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The danger in trying to do good is that the mind comes to confuse the intent of goodness with the act of doing things well.

goodness

Ursula K. Le Guin

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"Everybody's got the seam of goodness in them, Kit," said Grandpa. "Just a matter of whether it can be found and brought out into the light."

light goodness kit-s-wilderness seam

David Almond

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Some boys walk by and you cry, seeing them. They feel good, they look good, they are good. Oh, they're not above peeing off a bridge, or stealing an occasional dime-store pencil sharpener; it's not that. It's just, you know, seeing them pass, that's how they'll be all their life; they'll get hit, hurt, cut, bruised, and always wonder why, why does it happen? how can it happen to

pain good goodness people-will-hurt-you hurt cry description innocence vulnerable sad

Ray Bradbury

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Every man had his personal habits, passions, and impulses toward goodness, beauty, and truth.

goodness truth

Leo Tolstoy

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But the scent of the good is blown against the wind: A good man perfumes all directions.

goodness v-54

Anonymous

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Goodness works in mysterious ways. Even in the deepest dark, you'll find a light to shine your way through.

light goodness shine-your-light evil

Melissa de la Cruz

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The evil done by men of goodwill is the worst of all ... We have done terrible things, for the best of reasons, and that makes it worse.

goodness

Iain Pears

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Oh! if the good hearts had the fat purses, how much better everything would go!

wealth goodness giving les-misérables

Victor Hugo

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{ } heart was fathomlessly deep, long acquainted with humility, patience, sacrifice. His little home amid the roses was austerely simple; he knew the worthlessness of luxury, the joy of few possessions. The modesty with which he wore his scientific fame repeatedly reminded me of the trees that bend low with the burden of ripening fruits; it is the barren tree that lifts its head high in an empty boast. I was in New York when, in 1926, my dear passed away. In tears I thought, 'Oh, I would gladly walk all the way from here to Santa Rosa for one more glimpse of him!' Locking myself away from secretaries and visitors, I spent the next twenty-four hours in seclusion... name has now passed into the heritage of common speech. Listing 'burbank' as a transitive verb, Webster's New International Dictionary defines it: 'To cross or graft (a plant). Hence, figuratively, to improve (anything, as a process or institution) by selecting good features and rejecting bad, or by adding good features.' 'Beloved ,' I cried after reading the definition, 'your very name is now a synonym for goodness!

mourning grief joy goodness death sadness science friendship love burbank luther-burbank brotherhood modesty new-york

Paramahansa Yogananda

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Only God may be adored, because only God is unlimited goodness, truth, and beauty, and thus only God deserves unlimited love.

christianity goodness beauty spirituality god love philosophy truth inspirational unlimited-beauty unlimited-goodness unlimited-love unlimited-truth jesus-shock catholicism theology

Peter Kreeft

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The evil in the world must not make me doubt the existence of God. There could be no evil if there were no God. Before there can be a hole in a uniform, there must be a uniform; before there is death, there must be life; before there is error, there must be truth; before there is a crime, there must be liberty and law; before there is a war, there must be peace; before there is a devil, there must be a God, rebellion against whom made the devil.

goodness god the-devil evil

Fulton J. Sheen

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I know that people can be better than they are. We are capable of bearing a great burden, once we discover that the burden is reality and arrive where reality is.

people goodness self-awareness reality life

James Baldwin

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I saw the truth, I saw and I know that people can be beautiful and happy without losing the ability to live on earth. I will not and cannot believe that evil is the normal condition of people.

good-and-evil goodness truth

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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The road to happiness is paved with good deeds for others.

people goodness happiness life road-to-happiness purpose

Lisa Schroeder

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It is the good children, Madame, who make the most terrible revolutionaries. They say nothing, they do not hide under the table, they eat only one sweet at a time, but later on, they make Society pay dearly for it!

revenge goodness good-behaviour payback manners revolution

Jean-Paul Sartre

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"But how nice it would be to know that some good Yankee woman - And there must be SOME good Yankee women. I don't care what people say, they can't all be bad! How nice it would be to know that they pulled weeds off our men's graves and brought flowers to them, even if they were enemies. If Charlie were dead in the North it would comfort me to know that someone - And I don't care what you ladies think of me," her voice broke again, "I will withdraw from both clubs and I'll -- I'll pull up every weed off every Yankee's grave I can find and I'll plant flowers, too -- and -- I just dare anyone to stop me!"

humanity goodness gone-with-the-wind graves

Margaret Mitchell

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It isn't hard to find evil in this world. Evil is always more easily imagined than good, somehow.

good goodness evil

Gregory Maguire

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They constantly try to escape From the darkness outside and within By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good. But the man that is will shadow The man that pretends to be.

perfection escape goodness system shadow utopia

T.S. Eliot

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I mind how I said to you once that there is a price for being good the same as for being bad; a cost to pay. And it's the good men that cant deny the bill when it comes around. They cant deny it for the reason that there aint any way to make them pay it, like a honest man that gambles. The bad men can deny it; that's why dont anybody expect them to pay on sight or any other time. But the good cant. Maybe it takes longer to pay for being good than for being bad.

goodness price

William Faulkner

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Il n'est si homme de bien, qu'il mette a l'examen des loix toutes ses actions et pensees, qui ne soit pendable dix fois en sa vie. (There is no man so good that if he placed all his actions and thoughts under the scrutiny of the laws, he would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.)

thoughts goodness privacy laws guilt

Michel de Montaigne

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God is Infinite Wisdom, and Power, and Goodness - and LOVE; but if this idea is too vast for your human faculties - if your mind loses itself in its overwhelming infinitude, fix it on Him who condescended to take our nature upon Him, who was raised to Heaven even in His glorified human body, in whom the fulness of the Godhead shines.

goodness love wisdom jesus-christ power

Anne Brontë

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Some people are naturally good, you know, and others are not. I'm one of the others.

people goodness self-realization

L.M. Montgomery

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But, brothers, this biting of their toe-nails over what is the cause of badness is what turns me into a fine laughing malchick. They don't go into what is the cause of goodness, so why the other shop? If lewdies are good that's because they like it, and I wouldn't ever interfere with their pleasures, and so of the other shop. And I was patronizing the other shop. More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me or our oddy knockies, and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning tbey of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. And is not our modern history, my brothers, the story of brave malenky selves fighting these big machines? I am serious with you brothers, over this. But what I do I do because I like to do.

goodness choice cause evil

Anthony Burgess

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"We want them to see their home planet," Mrs. Whatsit said. The Medium lost the delighted smile she had worn till then. "Oh, why must you make me look at unpleasant things when there are so many delightful ones to see?" Again Mrs. Which's voice reverberated through the cave. "There will no longer be so many pleasant things to look at if responsible people do not do something about the unpleasant ones."

goodness truth standing-up-for-what-is-right

Madeleine L'Engle

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People won't admit it, they're too busy grabbing to see that the lights have fused. They can't see the darkness and the spider-face beyond and the great web of it all. That there's always this if you scratch at the surface of happiness and goodness. The black and the black and the black.

happy good dark people goodness darkness happiness fused grab grabbing scratch spider lights beyond web distraction see black surface distracted

John Fowles

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These are illusions of popular history which successful religion must promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumpths; a good deed is its own rewards; any bad human can be reformed; religious talismans protect one from demon possession; only females understand the ancient mysteries; the rich are doomed to unhappiness

virtue history good morality goodness faith religion religious belief-systems dune-arrakis dune-house-atreides evil-men falsehoods justice-of-god dune-messiah dune moral-law religion-philosophy falsehood historical-perspective history-of-thought history-of-mankind belief-system religion-spirituality religious-faith historical beliefs religions moral virtues morals evil

Frank Herbert

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Look, Miranda, he said, those twenty long years that lie between you and me. I've more knowledge of life than you, I've lived more and betrayed more and seen more betrayed. At your age one is bursting with ideals. You think that because I can sometimes see what's trivial and what's important in art that I ought to be more virtuous. But I don't want to be virtuous. My charm (if there is any) for you is simply frankness. And experience. Not goodness. I'm not a good man. Perhaps morally I'm younger even than you are. Can you understand that?

virtue good goodness life betrayed bursting younger older trivial ideals virtuous years frank old frankness betray important understand ideal experience charm knowledge betrayal young

John Fowles

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Oh God, it is amazing that men can talk so much about man's creaturely power and goodness, when, if thou didst not hold us back every moment, we should be devils incar nate.

men goodness god

Arthur  Bennett

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It is not easy to explain why God permits evil; but it is impossible for an atheist to explain the existence of goodness. How could a spiritless, soul-less, cross-less, Godless universe become the center of faith, purity, sacrifice, and martyrdom? How can decency be the decent thing if there is no God? Since God is love, why should we be surprised that want of it should end in pain, hate, broken hearts, and war?

morality goodness god

Fulton J. Sheen

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In short, all good things are wild and free.

goodness tameness wildness

Henry David Thoreau

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If there is any good in life, in history, in my own past, I invoke it now. I invoke it with all the passion with which I have lived.

history passion goodness past life

Elizabeth Kostova

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I have always known that the best of the Saracens could out-Christian many of us Christians.

equality goodness religion crusades openmindedness tolerance

Ellis Peters

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Benevolence is often very peremptory.

goodness

W. Somerset Maugham

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Oh, Gerty, I wasn't meant to be good.

goodness gerty-farish lily-bart the-house-of-mirth reputation

Edith Wharton

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"Six years previously, Miss Brodie had led her new class into the garden for a history lesson underneath the big elm. On the way through the school corridors they passed the headmistress's study. The door was wide open, the room was empty. 'Little girls,' said Miss Brodie, 'come and observe this.' They clustered round the open door while she pointed to a large poster pinned with drawing-pins on the opposite wall within the room. It depicted a man's big face. Underneath were the words 'Safety First'. 'This is Stanley Baldwin who got in as Prime Minister and got out again ere long,' said Miss Brodie. 'Miss Mackay retains him on the wall because she believes in the slogan "Safety First". But Safety does not come first. Goodness, Truth and Beauty come first. Follow me."

goodness truth girls teacher safety

Muriel Spark

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The death of God has set the angels free. And they are terrible. There are principalities and powers. Angels are the thoughts of God. Now he had been dissolved into his thoughts which are beyond our conception in their nature and their multiplicity and their power. God was at least the name of something which we thought was good. Now even the name has gone and the spiritual world is scattered. There is nothing any more to prevent the magnetism of many spirits.

goodness god

Iris Murdoch

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"Whoever infringes upon individual 'charity,'" I began, "infringes upon man's nature and scorns his personal dignity. But the organizing of 'social charity' and the question of personal freedom are two different questions and are not mutually exclusive. Individual goodness will always abide, because it is a personal need, a living need for the direct influence of one person on another. ... In sowing your seed, in sowing your 'charity,' your good deed in whatever form it takes, you give away part of your person and receive into yourself part of another's; you mutually commune in each other; a little more attention, and you will be rewarded with knowledge, with the most unexpected discoveries. You will be bound, finally, to look at your work as a science; it will take in the whole of your life and maybe fill the whole of it. On the other hand, all your thoughts, all the seeds you have sown, which you may already have forgotten, will take on flesh and grow; what was received from you will be passed on to someone else. And how do you know what share you will have in the future outcome of human destiny? And if the knowledge and the whole life of this work finally raises you so high that you are able to plant a tremendous seed, to bequeath a tremendous thought to mankind, then..."

goodness

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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"The Church makes no man less free than he was before. But we chiefly value freedom in order to give it away; every man who loves surrenders his freedom, whether his passion be the love of a woman, the love of a cause, or the love of God. . . Hence: "Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Everyone wants the things that only a love of God will bring to him, but most men today seek them in the wrong places. That is why no one comes to God without a revolution of the spirit; he must stop seeking his good in Godlessness."

goodness love godlessness

Fulton J. Sheen

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[In the story of the Good Samaritan,] everybody knows the robber is bad--but doesn't Jesus also imply an indictment on the priest and Levite? . . . The priest and Levite are over here. They are 'righteous' in a superficial way. They don't rob anybody. They're not like that lousy criminal who is over here, on the bad end of the line. Do you see it? That's the line we modern Christians try to live on the right end of it . . . The Samaritan traveler lives on a higher level, altogether. The issue isn't who is wrong or righteous; that's obvious. The issue is who is truly good.

righteousness goodness righteous

Brian D. McLaren

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To be truly good means more than not robbing people . . . To be truly good means more than being righteously religious . . . To be truly good means being a good neighbor. . . . And to be a good neighbor means recognizing that there are ultimately no strangers. . . . Everybody is my neighbor! . . . Everybody is my brother! . . . There are no isolated monads wounded on the other side of the street! . . . We're all connected.

righteousness goodness neighbor good-samaritan

Brian D. McLaren

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...she thought of him as a person who did not have a normal spine, but had instead, a firm reed of goodness.

morality goodness

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

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He has written about equality, the perfectibility of human nature, and the essential goodness of mankind for many years -- he judges others by himself, poor soul.

goodness judgment human-nature

Patrick O'Brian