It is a great deal easier for a man to find a pedigree to fit his virtues than virtues to fit his pedigree.
It can fairly be said of John Smith that he had all the virtues of a Scottish presbyterian, but none of the vices.
Charity and good-nature give a sanction to the most common actions; and pride and ill-nature make our best virtues despicable.
War is one of the nation's most honored virtues, and its militaristic values now bear down on almost every aspect of American life.
Not to be cheered by praise, not to be grieved by blame, but to know thoroughly one's own virtues or powers are the characteristics of an excellent man.
What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have never been discovered.
One of the virtues of the NHS. . . it doesn't worry you about money at the moment when you're least capable of doing anything about it.
In ancient days the Pythagoreans were used to change names with each other,--fancying that each would share the virtues they admired in the other.
I always wish to find great virtues where there are great talents, and to love what I admire.
Though pride is not a virtue, it is the parent of many virtues.
Democracy's worst fault is that its leaders are likely to reflect the faults and virtues of their constituents.
Gilbert Jonas, painter, believed in his star. . . . His own faith was not, however, without its virtues because it consisted in admitting, in some obscure way, that he would obtain many things without deserving them.
Frugality is the mother of all virtues.
One must have all the virtues to sleep well. Shall I bear false witness? Shall I commit adultery? Shall I covet my neighbor's maid? All that would go ill with good sleep.
By the worldly standards of public life, all scholars in their work are of course oddly virtuous. They do not make wild claims, they do not cheat, they do not try to persuade at any cost, they appeal neither to prejudice nor to authority, they are often frank about their ignorance, their disputes are fairly decorous, they do not confuse what is being argued with race, politics, sex or age, they listen patiently to the young and to the old who both know everything. These are the general virtues of scholarship, and they are peculiarly the virtues of science.
If a woman possesses manly virtues one should run away from her; and if she does not possess them she runs away from herself.
Chastity prays for me, piety sings, Innocence sweetens my last black breath, Modesty hides my thighs in her wings, And all the deadly virtues plague my death!
Complaisance, though in itself it be scarce reckoned in the number of moral virtues, is that which gives a lustre to every talent a man can be possessed of. It was Plato's advice to an unpolished writer that he should sacrifice to the graces. In the same manner I would advise every man of learning, who would not appear in the world a mere scholar or philosopher, to make himself master of the social virtue which I have here mentioned.
He has all of the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.
Even if I could, I would not exahnge their virtues for my own. And that is why they are intent on learning from me.