Quotes About Conscience

He that hath a blind conscience which sees nothing, a dead conscience which feels nothing, and a dumb conscience which says nothing, is in as miserable a condition as a man can be on this side of hell.

An overblown conscience is an empty conscience.

Men are guided less by conscience than by glory; and yet the shortest way to glory is to be guided by conscience.

Compulsion in the literal Sense is maliciously misrepresented, by supposing it authorizes Violences committed against the Truth. The Answer to this; by which it is prov'd, that the literal Sense does in reality authorize the stirring up Persecutions against the Cause of Truth, and that an erroneous Conscience has the same Rights as an enlighten'd Conscience.

Any attempt to replace a personal conscience by a collective conscience does violence to the individual and is the first step toward totalitarianism.

Given - and this is the fundamental thing - that God's mercy has no limits, if He is approached with a sincere and repentant heart, the question for those who do not believe in God is to abide by their own conscience. There is sin, also for those who have no faith, in going against one's conscience. Listening to it and abiding by it means making up one's mind about what is good and evil.

If your opponent has a conscience, then follow Gandhi and nonviolence. But if your enemy has no conscience like Hitler, then follow Bonhoeffer.

What is the importance of human lives? Is it their continuing alive for so many years like animals in a menagerie? The value of a man cannot be judged by the number of diseases from which he escapes. The value of a man is in his human qualities: in his character, in his conscience, in the nobility and magnanimity, of his soul. Torturing animals to prolong human life has separated science from the most important thing that life has produced - the human conscience.

The antagonism between life and conscience may be removed in two ways: by a change of life or by a change of conscience.

Government is merely an attempt to express the conscience of everybody, the average conscience of the nation, in the rules that everybody is commanded to obey. That is all it is.

A vote is "wasted" when someone fails to vote their conscience.

Every man has a paradise around him till he sins, and the angel of an accusing conscience drives him from his Eden.

It's very rarely a good career move to have a conscience.

The great discovery of the nineteenth century, that we are of one blood with the lower animals, has created new ethical obligations which have not yet penetrated the public conscience. The clerical profession has been lamentably remiss in preaching this obvious duty.

The paths by which people journey toward happiness lie in part through the world about them and in part through the experience of their souls. On the one hand, there is the happiness which comes from wealth, honor, the enjoyment of life, from health, culture, science, or art; and, on the other hand, there is the happiness which is to be found in a good conscience, in virtue, work, philanthropy, religion, devotion to great ideas and great deeds.

I can't be a part of the problem. I hate the idea of a label just as much as anyone else but I'm with who I'm with, I love who I love and I'm if not a better actress than I was yesterday and my personal life should have no effect on that. I think that the injustice of people staying in the closet is more than I can bear with a clear conscience and I couldn't sleep at night if I was a part of that problem, if I was part of the lies.

The Obama Administration's obsession with forcing mandates on the American people has now reached a new low by violating the conscience rights and religious liberties of our people.

The most identifiable trait of Anglo-Saxons is that we always mistake a short memory for a clear conscience.

A man's moral conscience is the curse he had to accept from the gods in order to gain from them the right to dream.

I keep trying to forget, but I must remember. And gather the scattered continents of a self, once whole. Before they plant flags and boundary my destiny. Push down the watered mountains that blemish this soiled soul before the valleys of my conscience get the best of me. I'll need a passport just to simply reach the rest of me. A vaccination for a lesser god's bleak history.

A quiet conscience makes one so serene.

Bad men cannot make good citizens. A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience are incompatible with freedom.

The devil comes in many guises-anger in the form of justice-passion in the form of duty. When it first comes, the man knows and then he forgets. Just as your pleaders' conscience; at first they know it is all Badmashi (roguery), then it is duty to their clients; at last they get hardened.

The New Age movement looks like a mixed bag. I see much in it that seems good: It's optimistic; it's enthusiastic; it has the capacity for belief. On the debit side, I think one needs to distinguish between belief and credulity. How deep does New Age go? Has it come to terms with radical evil? More, I am not sure how much social conscience there is in New Age thinking.

As long as our government is administered for the good of the people, and is regulated by their will; as long as it secures to us the rights of person and property, liberty of conscience, and of the press, it will be worth defending.

As blacks, we need not be afraid that encouraging moral development, a conscience and guilt will prevent social action. Black children without the ability to feel a normal amount of guilt will victimize their parents, relatives and community first. They are unlikely to be involved in social action to improve the black community. Their self-centered personalities will cause them to look out for themselves without concern for others, black or white.

...the fact [is] that our borders leak like a sieve: those things cannot be permitted to continue in good conscience.

Probably the deepest use of music and of art is to create conscience.

Writing takes a combination of sophistication and innocence; it takes conscience, our belief that something is beautiful because it is right.

Anyone who can appease a man's conscience can take his freedom away from him.

Of the liberty of conscience in matters of religious faith, of speech and of the press; of the trial by jury of the vicinage in civil and criminal cases; of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus; of the right to keep and bear arms.... If these rights are well defined, and secured against encroachment, it is impossible that government should ever degenerate into tyranny.

Modern capitalism needs men who cooperate smoothly and in large numbers; who want to consume more and more; and whose tastes are standardized and can be easily influenced and anticipated. It needs men who feel free and independent, not subject to any authority or principle or conscience-- yet willing to be commanded, to do what is expected of them, to fit into the social machine without friction; who can be guided without force, led without leaders, prompted without aim-- except the one to make good, to be on the move, to function, to go ahead.

And these [pharmaceutical] companies are still threatening to sue. And it's like, you know, do you not have a conscience? Do you not want the world to be a better place? You're still making a profit. How much more of a profit do you want to make?

Philanthropist, n.: A rich (and usually bald) old gentleman who has trained himself to grin while his conscience is picking his pocket.

You ask me what forces me to speak? a strange thing; my conscience.

If the scholar feels that he must know everything about any topic, he is in trouble - and will not publish with a clear conscience.

He was a lifelong Republican, but over the years, Harry Blackmun built a reputation as a liberal, sometimes defiant Justice, whose fierce protection of individual rights led some to anoint him the moral conscience of the court.

Some people will follow their minds without listening to their hearts, and others will follow their hearts without listening to their minds. This is why reason exists, for there to be balance between the heart and mind. We were not meant to follow the mind and ignore the heart. Instead, we were meant to follow the heart over the mind, but without completely abandoning logic. The middle way is the preferred way, and this path simply means to allow your heart to drive you, but do not forget to balance reason with your conscience.

Deep down, the US, with its space, its technological refinement, its bluff good conscience, even in those spaces which it opens up for simulation, is the only remaining primitive society.

Perhaps conscience did not always produce cowards. Sometimes it made a man feel better about himself.

Conscience reigns but it does not govern.

Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits.

All a man can betray is his conscience.

A person who sins neither in thought nor deed, and is fair and just, gains enormous courage and strength. As a leader, you need courage born of integrity in order to be capable of powerful leadership. To achieve this courage, you must search your heart, and make sure your conscience is clear and your behavior is beyond reproach.

There is a higher court than courts of justice and that is the court of conscience. It supercedes all other courts.

If we are at peace with God and our own conscience, what enemy among men need we fear?

In many walks of life, a conscience is a more expensive encumbrance than a wife or a carriage.

People of conscience need to break their ties with corporations financing the injustice of climate change.