Pro deo et patria - For God and Country (Motto of American University)
Per veritatem vis - Strength through truth (Motto of Washington University in St Louis)
Corruptissima republica plurimae leges - When the republic is at its most corrupt the laws are most numerous (Tacitus)
The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern. (Lord Acton)
We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give. (Winston Churchill)
Youth ages, immaturity is outgrown, ignorance can be educated, drunkenness sobered, but stupid lasts forever. (Aristophanes)
No government ought to be without censors & where the press is free, no one ever will. (Thomas Jefferson, letter to George Washington, September 9, 1792)
Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains.(Jean Jacques Rousseau)
Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death (Patrick Henry)
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. (John Donne)
The unexamined life is not worth living (Socrates)
The only true wisdom is knowing you know nothing. (Socrates)
Memento mori - remember that [you will] die (Motto of Trappist Order)
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. (Mahatma Gandhi)
Alterius non sit qui suus esse potest - Let no man belong to another that can belong to himself (Aesop Fables, Paracles' Motto)
Cuiusvis hominis est errare, nullius nisi insipientis in errore perseverare - Anyone can err, but only the fool persists in his fault (Marcus Tullius Cicero)
It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation which give happiness. (Thomas Jefferson)
salus populi suprema lex esto - the welfare of the people is to be the highest law (From Cicero's De Legibus, book III, part III, sub. VIII)
Omnia relinquit servare Republicam -He gave up everything to preserve the Republic (Motto of Cincinnatus)
Associate yourself with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation, for 'tis better to be alone than in bad company (George Washington)
Duty is ours, results are God's. (John Quincy Adams)
It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err. (Mahatma Gandhi)
You must be the change you want to see in the world. (Mahatma Gandhi)
In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. (Thomas Jefferson)
I have the consolation of having added nothing to my private fortune during my public service, and of retiring with hands clean as they are empty. (Thomas Jefferson, letter to Count Diodati, 1807)
Be civil to all; sociable to many; familiar with few; friend to one; enemy to none. (Benjamin Franklin)
Even on the most exalted throne in the world we are only sitting on our own bottom. (Michel de Montaigne)
As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State "What does it matter to me?" the State may be given up for lost. (Jean Jacques Rousseau)
Sic semper tyrannis - Thus always to tyrants (motto of Virginia)
Everything looks impossible for people who never try anything. (Joan Louis Etienna)
How a person masters his fate is more important than what his fate is. (Wilhelm von Humboldt)
Learning is not obtained by chance. It must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence. (Abigail Adams)
Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something. (Plato)
A man does what he must — in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures — and that is the basis of all human morality. (Winston Churchill)
No man is more unhappy than he who never faces adversity. For he is not permitted to prove himself. (Seneca)
We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life. (Theodore Roosevelt)
A man must stand erect, not be kept erect by others. (Marcus Aurelius)
Who—only let him be a man and intent upon honor—is not eager for the honorable ordeal and prompt to assume perilous duties? To what energetic man is not idleness a punishment? (Seneca)
We need the iron qualities that go with true manhood. We need the positive virtues of resolution, of courage, of indomitable will, of power to do without shrinking the rough work that must always be done. (Theodore Roosevelt)
Private and public life are subject to the same rules—truth and manliness are two qualities that will carry you through this world much better than policy or tact of expediency or other words that were devised to conceal a deviation from a straight line. (Robert E. Lee)
Without an adversary, virtus shrivels. We see how great and how viable virtus is when, by endurance, it shows what it is capable of. (Seneca)
It is of dangerous consequence to represent to man how near he is to the level of beasts, without showing him at the same time his greatness. It is likewise dangerous to let him see his greatness without his meanness. It is more dangerous yet to leave him ignorant of either; but very beneficial that he should be made sensible of both. (Blaise Pascal)
One cannot always be a hero, but one can always be a man. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
The way of a superior man is three-fold: virtuous, he is free from anxieties; wise, he is free from perplexities; bold, he is free from fear. (Confucius)
Show me the man you honour, and I will know what kind of a man you are, for it shows me what your ideal of manhood is, and what kind of a man you long to be. (Thomas Carlyle)
A man is one whose body has been trained to be the ready servant of his mind; whose passions are trained to be the servants of his will; who enjoys the beautiful, loves truth, hates wrong, loves to do good, and respects others as himself. (John Ruskin)
Duty is the essence of manhood. (George S. Patton)
A man should be able to hear, and to bear, the worst that could be said of him. (Saul Bellow)
We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful. (C.S. Lewis)
Adversity toughens manhood, and the characteristic of the good or the great man is not that he has been exempt from the evils of life, but that he has surmounted them. (Patrick Henry)
It is a grand mistake to think of being great without goodness; and I pronounce it as certain, that there never was yet a truly great man, that was not at the same time truly virtuous. (Benjamin Franklin)
History is strewn with the wrecks of nations which have gained a little progressiveness at the cost of a great deal of hard manliness, and have thus prepared themselves for destruction as soon as the movements of the world have a chance for it. (Walter Bagehot)
Life is too short to be little. Man is never so manly as when he feels deeply, acts boldly, and expresses himself with frankness and with fervor. (Benjamin Disraeli)
The man who is deserving the name is the one whose thoughts and exertions are for others rather than for himself. (Walter Scott)
What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others. (Pericles)
Quality is not an act, it is a habit. (Aristotle)
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently and die gallantly. Specialization is for insects! (Robert A. Heinlein - Author of Starship Troopers)
Litigiousness is not a legal but a social phenomenon. It is born of a breakdown in community, a breakdown that exacerbates and is exacerbated by the growth of law. But until there is a consensus on fundamental principles, the trust that is essential to a self-ordering community cannot be. (Jethro K. Lieberman "The Litigious Society")
Benjamin Franklin's 13 Virtues
- Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
- Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
- Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
- Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
- Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
- Industry. Lose no time; be always employ'd in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
- Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
- Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
- Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
- Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation.
- Tranquillity. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
- Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
- Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.