Cases in Point

When I talked about morality, I wasn't necessarily expecting extreme cases to present themselves.

When I tell myself the standards I'd like to meet, people like this fantastic young person (sadly dead now), Rachel Beckwith come to mind. She is proof enough that young people aren't all as self-absorbed as people claim, certainly not as much as the idgets in Washington.

When I say that I can't possibly pretend that I can judge some choices I've never had to face, that I can't imagine how I'd ever live through, cases like this come to mind. I've never been faced with death like this, with choosing which child to save, with having to abandon some children to have a chance to save others. I'm selfish enough I hope I never do. I couldn't judge the choices they make. How could I?

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Saturday Quotathon: Chivalry

In honor of what I and Merriam Webster think chivalry ought to be, I'm looking for quotes that involve honor, generosity and courtesy.

Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love. This is the eternal rule.
-Gautama Buddha

I am disinclined to aquiesce to your request. Means no.
-Barbossa from Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl

For the sake of the flowers, the weeds are watered.
-Arabic Proverb

What a man believes may be ascertained, not from his creed, but from the assumptions on which he habitually acts.
- George Bernard Shaw

The greatest friend of Truth is time, her greatest enemy is Prejudice, and her constant companion Humility.
- Charles Caleb Colton

Where there is great love there are always miracles.
- Willa Cather

Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.
- Friedrich Nietzsche

In the end it is how you fight, as much as why you fight, that makes your cause good or bad.
- Freeman Dyson

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
- Mahatma Gandhi

It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing.
- Muhammad

An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.
- Thomas Paine

We are here to add what we can to, not to get what we can from, Life.
-William Osler, M.D.

Tact is the art of making guests feel at home when that’s really where you wish they were.
-George E. Bergman

Treat a child as though he already is the person he’s capable of becoming.
-Haim Ginott

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.
-Steve Jobs

You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.
-Mahatma Gandhi

We are on the cusp of this time where I can say, "I speak as a citizen of the world" without others saying, "God, what a nut."
- Lawrence Lessig

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy's point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

I believe that in India "cold weather" is merely a conventional phrase and has come into use through the necessity of having some way to distinguish between weather which will melt a brass doorknob and weather which will only make it mushy.
-Mark Twain [not mean, but funny]

Be kind - Remember every one you meet is fighting a battle - everybody's lonesome.
--Marion Parker

Be civil to all; sociable to many; familiar with few; friend to one; enemy to none.
-- Benjamin Franklin

Be honorable yourself if you wish to associate with honorable people.
--Welsh Proverb

It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.
--Samuel Johnson

Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.
-Aristotle

'But we should kill him!'
'No. You've been listen to Brocando too often,' said Bane.
Brocando bristled. 'You know what he is! Why not kill--' he began, but he was interrupted.
'Because it doesn't matter what he is. It matters what we are.'
-Terry Pratchett

I learned the lesson that great men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.
-Booker T. Washington

Do not confuse "duty" with what other people expect of you; they are utterly different. Duty is a debt you owe to yourself to fulfill obligations you have assumed voluntarily. Paying that debt can entail anything from years of patient work to instant willingness to die. Difficult it may be, but the reward is self-respect.
- Robert A. Heinlein

I do believe that man is a rope between animal and superman. But the superman I'm thinking of isn't Nietzsche's. The real superhuman, man or woman, is the person who's rid himself of all prejudices, neuroses, and psychoses, who realizes his full potential as a human being, who acts naturally on the basis of gentleness, compassion, and love, who thinks for himself and refuses to follow the herd. That's the genuine dyed-in-the-wool superman.
- Philip José Farmer

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