Quotes about Ethics

Hence while in respect of its substance and the definition that states what it really is in essence virtue is the observance of the mean, in point of excellence and rightness it is an extreme.

There is no such thing as observing a mean in excess or deficiency, nor as exceeding or falling short in observance of a mean.

There is one end we all have — not in virtue of being rational, but simply in virtue of being human being — and that is happiness.

All virtue is summed up in dealing justly.

By the way, a question is sometimes raised, whether the moral choice or the actions have most to do with Virtue, since it consists in both: it is plain that the perfection of virtuous action requires both: but for the actions many things are required, and the greater and more numerous they are the more.

good character is the indispensable condition and chief determinant of happiness, itself the goal of all human doing.

Again, it is for the sake of the soul that goods external and goods of the body are eligible at all, and all wise men ought to choose them for the sake of the soul, and not the soul for the sake of them.

rhetoric was to be surveyed from the standpoint of philosophy.

Any polis which is truly so called, and is not merely one in name, must devote itself to the end of encouraging goodness. Otherwise, political association sinks into a mere alliance.

Moral virtue is the quality of acting in the best way in relation to pleasures and pains, and that vice is the opposite.

Nevertheless, Rhetoric is useful, because the true and the just are naturally superior to their opposites, so that, if decisions are improperly made, they must owe their defeat to their own advocates; which is reprehensible.

We cannot be prudent without being good.