Quotes about Virtue
He who shaneth not small faults falleth little by little into greater.
— Thomas a Kempis
Charity is love; not all love is charity.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Charity is not a potency of the soul, because if it were it would be natural. Nor is it a passion, because it is not in a sensitive potency in which are all passions. Nor is it a habit, because a habit is removed with difficulty; charity, however, is easily lost through one act of mortal sin. Therefore charity is not something created in the soul.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Moreover, virtue is not concerned with the amount of pleasure experienced by the external sense, as this depends on the disposition of the body; what matters is how much the interior appetite is affected by that pleasure.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
To bear with patience wrongs done to oneself is a mark of perfection, but to bear with patience wrongs done to someone else is a mark of imperfection and even of actual sin.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
To live well is to work well, to show a good activity.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Temperance is simply a disposition of the mind which binds the passion.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Well-ordered self-love is right and natural.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
It must be said that charity can, in no way, exist along with mortal sin.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
I answer that, As Augustine says (De Moribus Eccl. vi), "the soul needs to follow something in order to give birth to virtue: this something is God: if we follow Him we shall live aright.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
He who is not angry when there is just cause for anger is immoral. Why? Because anger looks to the good of justice. And if you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust.
— St. Thomas Aquinas
Temperance is simply a disposition of the mind which set bounds to the passions
— St. Thomas Aquinas