Virtue Quotes

.. is there not one true coin for which all things ought to exchange?- and that is wisdom; and only in exchange for this, and in company with this, is anything truly bought or sold, whether courage, temperance or justice. And is not all true virtue the companion of wisdom, no matter what fears or pleasures or other similar goods or evils may or may not attend her? But the virtue which is made up of these goods, when they are severed from wisdom and exchanged with one another, is a shadow of virtue only, nor is there any freedom or health or truth in her; but in the true exchange there is a purging away of all these things, and temperance, and justice, and courage, and wisdom herself, are a purgation of them.

~ Socrates

...a great man who is vicious will only be a great doer of evil, and a rich man who is not liberal will be only a miserly beggar; for the possessor of wealth is not made happy by possessing it, but by spending it - and not by spending as he please but by knowing how to spend it well. To the poor gentleman there is no other way of showing that he is a gentleman than by virtue, by being affable, well-bred, courteous, gentle-mannered and helpful; not haughty, arrogant or censorious, but above all by being charitable...and no one who sees him adorned with the virtues I have mentioned, will fail to recognize and judge him, though he know him not, to be of good stock.

~ Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

He thought of the virtues of courage and forbearance, which become flabby when there is nothing to use them on.

~ John Steinbeck

Was man, indeed, at once so powerful, so virtuous and magnificent, yet so vicious and base? He appeared at one time a mere scion of the evil principle and at another as all that can be conceived of noble and godlike. To be a great and virtuous man appeared the highest honour that can befall a sensitive being; to be base and vicious, as many on record have been, appeared the lowest degradation, a condition more abject than that of the blind mole or harmless worm. For a long time I could not conceive how one man could go forth to murder his fellow, or even why there were laws and governments; but when I heard details of vice and bloodshed, my wonder ceased and I turned away with disgust and loathing.

~ Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

It all seemed a hollow sham now - that strict code, that conscientious virtue that condemned her to the sterile joys of pious women! No, no, she'd had enough of that; she wanted to live!

~ Émile Zola

Areté is a word that means excellence in character and life. It is the accumulation of virtue in one's life.

~ Tobin Wilson

Courage is chief among virtues. For when any virtue is challenged, it is courage alone that can restore virtue.

~ Jack B. Nicholson

What about the virtue of letting others be themselves? Is this not the greatest virtue of all?

~ Joshua Emmet

I am astonished at the pleasure one experiences in doing good, and I should be tempted to believe that what we call virtuous people have not so much merit as they lead us to suppose.

~ Pierre-Ambroise Choderlos De Laclos

It is said a virtuous woman is worth more than rubies. But I believe many men discover the hard way that virtue, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder.

~ Amanda Quick

If being alive is not a virtue, then there is little virtue in virtue.

~ Tom Robbins

You instinctively display the greatest virtue, or rather the chief defect, of us eccentric Parisians- that is, you assume the vices you have not, and conceal the virtues you possess.

~ Alexandre Dumas

Men's evil manners live in brass, their virtue we write in water.

~ William Shakespeare

Withersoever the wheel of Fortune turns, Virtue stands firm upon her feet.

~ Benvenuto Cellini

Oh, my friends, that your self be in your deed as the mother is in her child - let that be your word concerning virtue!

~ Friedrich Nietzsche

There is an aesthetic dimension to virtue. In real life, as opposed to in celluloid, we are attracted to the good and repelled by the bad. Even the woman who says she prefers the archetypal 'bad boy' probably doesn't actually like it when he is bad toward her.

~ John Dickson

Virtues are in the popular estimate rather the exception than the rule.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Of all fragrances, the sweetest is that of virtue.

~ Isabel Allende

I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.

~ George Washington

Peace is the virtue of civilization. War is its crime.

~ Victor Hugo

Our failings sometimes bind us to one another as closely as could virtue itself.

~ Luc De Clapiers

The strength of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts.

~ Blaise Pascal

Tolerance is a virtue that depends upon peace and strength.

~ Charles Lindbergh

Virtue is an inner strength. It expands your nature.

~ John Bradshaw

Patience is a virtue, and I'm learning patience. It's a tough lesson.

~ Elon Musk

Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue.

~ Ambrose Bierce

Patience, the beggar's virtue, shall find no harbor here.

~ Philip Massinger

Virtue can only flourish among equals.

~ Mary Wollstonecraft

In Islamic societies, politicians can manipulate almost everything. But thus far, no fundamentalist leader has been able to convince his supporters to renounce Islam's central virtue - the principle of strict equality between human beings, regardless of sex, race, or creed.

~ Fatema Mernissi

Those who have virtue always in their mouths, and neglect it in practice, are like a harp, which emits a sound pleasing to others, while itself is insensible of the music.

~ Diogenes

There is no austerity equal to a balanced mind, and there is no happiness equal to contentment; there is no disease like covetousness, and no virtue like mercy.

~ Chanakya

Happiness is secured through virtue it is a good attained by man's own will.

~ Thomas Aquinas

Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that but simply growth, We are happy when we are growing.

~ William Butler Yeats

Happiness is a virtue, not its reward.

~ Baruch Spinoza

Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning.

~ William S. Burroughs

Superior virtue must be the fruit of superior intelligence.

~ William Godwin

There is a heroism in crime as well as in virtue. Vice and infamy have their altars and their religion.

~ William Hazlitt

Punctuality is the virtue of the bored.

~ Evelyn Waugh

Virtue is persecuted more by the wicked than it is loved by the good.

~ Buddha

Skepticism is a virtue in history as well as in philosophy.

~ Napoléon Bonaparte