Good (category)

“ It is not enough to ask what is most attractive, what line of life will ensure the greatest material gain or worldly honour? Rather should we ask, Where shall I be safest from moral danger, and, above all, in what position of life, open to me, can I do the most good? ”

“ Now we must ask these persons the following questions: Whether to desire what is good is virtuous or vicious; and whether the desire to run in order to reach the goal in the pursuit of what is good be worthy of praise or censure? ”

“ Every one does in fact understand the question ‘Is this good?’ When he thinks of it, his state of mind is different from what it would be, were he asked ‘Is this pleasant, or desired, or approved?’ It has a distinct meaning for him, even though he may not recognise in what respect it is distinct. ”

“ Thus, in conduct, actions are judged 'good' or 'evil' and 'right' or 'wrong'; in thinking, ideas are 'true' or 'false,' and 'relevant' or 'irrelevant'; for art, objects are 'beautiful' or 'ugly,' and so forth, for the modes of valuation in life are innumerable. Any one of these adjectives either denotes value or censures lack of worth, and each gets its meaning by reference to the specific purpose, moral, aesthetic, or intellectual, it appeals to. The summum bonum, or supreme good, will then be the ideal of the harmonious satisfaction of all purposes. ”

“ Let wants and necessities, and trials and difficulties, not be forgotten, but let them not be the whole subject-matter of discourse. No, let it range far more widely, far more attractively; and your looks and your demeanor, and your tones and words, being all directed by good will, and by practice too, you indeed will be no idler in good works during times and occasions thus employed. You will win much love, much esteem, much appreciation; you will hear much right feeling expressed, and, at times, much to inform you of a practical kind. You will do good and receive good too. ”

“ As all beautiful and all true things refer themselves, these to a Unity which is absolute TRUTH, and those to a Unity which is absolute BEAUTY, so all the moral principles centre in a single principle, which is THE GOOD. Thus we arrive at the conception of THE GOOD in itself, the ABSOLUTE Good, superior to all particular duties, and determinate in those duties. ”

“ With what grace, intelligence, and appreciation of values would you move among the other monitors of great fortunes, admired by them, praised, and loved, I think. What a factor for good you could become! ”

“ In submitting fine art to moral criticism, I shall use it as the best representative of the whole class of activities which I have just described. If we have not been wholly astray in our analysis of the good, it should appear that these activities owe their pre-eminence not to their bare quality or tone, but to their humanity, that is, to their connection with a harmonious, just, and progressive state of society. ”

“ Taking, as our limits necessarily oblige us to take, a broad survey of the principle, and the results of the principle disclosed by experience, we cheerfully pronounce both to be positively and undeniably good. ”

“ All that can, I think, be done by way of making plain what kinds of things are intrinsically good or bad, and what are better or worse than others, is to classify some of the chief kinds of each, pointing out what the factors are upon which their goodness or badness depends. ”

“ Good is divided into four kinds. One is the possessor of virtue, whom we affirm to be individually good. Another is virtue itself and justice; these we affirm to be good. A third includes such things as food, suitable exercises and drugs. The fourth kind which we affirm to be good includes the arts of flute-playing, acting and the like. Thus there are four kinds of good: the possession of virtue; virtue itself; thirdly, food and beneficial exercises; lastly, flute-playing, acting, and the poetic art. 102. Whatever is is either evil or good or indifferent. ”

“ The object is in a compound proportion to the quantity of happiness produced, and the correspondence of the mode in which it is distributed, to the elementary feelings of man as a social being.
The disposition in an individual to promote this object is called virtue; and the two constituent parts of virtue, benevolence and justice, are correlative with these two great portions of the only true object of all voluntary actions of a human being. Benevolence is the desire to be the author of good, and justice the apprehension of the manner in which good ought to be done. ”

“ The inducements to virtue are, in his view, our humane sentiments, on the one hand, and our self-love, or prudence, on the other; the two classes of motives conspiring to promote both our own good and the good of mankind. ”

“ The good of man, the improvement of the labouring classes, the softening of their character, the refinement of their tastes, the development of intellect, and the correction of what is low and sensual in their enjoyments, are named as the objects of pursuit: and no one can hesitate as to the importance of these points, nor as to the value which all things lovely and of good report possess in christian estimation. ”

“ And, indeed, nothing is ordinarily regarded as good, except either for some utility -- as, for instance, safety is called good, and those things which promote safety --or for some honorable character -- as, for instance, beauty is reckoned to be good, and what promotes beauty. ”

“ Well, then, if I have been successful in laying down any right principles, in exposing anything disadvantageous, or in presenting any available means for rendering your daily intercourse more evidently kind, more evidently sympathizing, more evidently, in a word, such as that which every good man would wish to exhibit, and which must render him not only welcome and not only useful, but a real and true ornament of society in the best sense of the word ”

“ So, to pursue these gentlemen’s discourse, which I wholly approve and confirm, I say that of the things that we call good, there are some which simply and in themselves are always good, like temperance, fortitude, health, and all the virtues that bestow tranquillity upon the mind; others, which are good in various respects and for the object to which they tend, like law, liberality, riches, and other like things. ”

“ The relation which ethical judgments assert to hold universally between 'goodness' and other things are of two kinds: a thing may be asserted either to be good itself or to be causally related to something else which is itself good—to be 'good as a means.' 21 16. ”

“ And further light is thrown upon his meaning when he comes to tell you what he thinks the good for man is: the good, he says, is "mental, activity—where such activity is of an excellent kind, or, if there are several different kinds of excellent mental activity, that which has the best and most perfect kind of excellence ”

“ Then the qualities of HONESTY, FIDELITY, and TRUTH, are praised, in the first place, for their tendency to the good of society; and, being established on that foundation, they are also approved as advantageous to the individual's own self. ”

“ When we recognize that actions which we call good and bad are so called because of their causal relation to pain and pleasure, the belief must arise in us, that the worth of qualities of character depends on the promise they contain of future action. The most important power for the happiness or misery of humanity is the character of human beings. Hence the morally good, excellence of character, is to be regarded as preëminently Good. ”

“ Again, for the degrees and comparative nature of good, they have also excellently handled it in their triplicity of good, in the comparisons between a contemplative and an active life, in the distinction between virtue with reluctation and virtue secured, in their encounters between honesty and profit, in their balancing of virtue with virtue, and the like; so as this part deserveth to be reported for excellently laboured. ”

“ Let us suppose, in the first place, that it is meant to hold everywhere.
Then (1) we are taking for granted that nothing is good in itself; that only the means to something else are good; that ‘good,’ in a word, = ‘good for,’ and good for something else. ”

“ that is the aim of the one and the other because good character is the indispensable condition and chief determinant of happiness, itself the goal of all human doing. The end of all action, individual or collective, is the greatest happiness of the greatest number. ”

“ If one says, "It is still good qua good will," we may reply, "Yes, but so are all goods; courage is always good qua courage, knowledge qua knowledge," etc. All harmless joys are good without qualification, and all goods whatever are good except as they get in the way of some greater good or lead to trouble. ”

“ Its modern forms have been greatly varied, but they all153 agree in founding the morally good in utility. That which experience shows to be useful, as promotive of personal or social interests and happiness, becomes thereby right, or the norm of moral choices and conduct. The theory, in all its modifications, is a "goods" theory,51 interpreting obligation as simply the behest to conform life to the attainment of the various forms of good, even the chief, as happiness or enjoyment, provided for in man's nature and condition. ”

“ The exercise of that prudence and caution which I have recommended, will lead you to a thorough investigation of the character and views of the man by whom you are addressed.
“Without good principles, both of religion and morality, (for the latter cannot exist independent of the former) you can not safely rely, either upon his fidelity or his affection. Good principles are the foundation of a good life. ”

“ He should consider the bearing of all these things which have been mentioned severally and collectively upon virtue; he should know what the effect of beauty is when combined with poverty or wealth in a particular soul, and what are the good and evil consequences of noble and humble birth, of private and public station, of strength and weakness, of cleverness and dulness, and of all the natural and acquired gifts of the soul, and the operation of them when conjoined ”

“ Moreover, they divide all existing things into good, bad, and indifferent. The good are the virtues, prudence, justice, manly courage, temperance, and the rest of the like qualities. The bad are the contraries, folly, injustice, and the like. ”

“ If, on the other hand, I say that this is the greatest good to man, to discourse daily on virtue, and other things which you have heard me discussing, examining both myself and others, but that a life without investigation is not worth living for, still less would you believe me if I said this. ”

“ But if you can fix some conception of a true human state of life to be striven for—life, good for all men, as for yourselves; if you can determine some honest and simple order of existence; following those trodden ways of wisdom, which are pleasantness, [228] and seeking her quiet and withdrawn paths, which are peace;—then, and so sanctifying wealth into "commonwealth," all your art, your literature, your daily labours, your domestic affection, and citizen's duty, will join and increase into one magnificent harmony. You will know then how to build, well enough; ”

“ All possible perfections, both moral and natural, must needs be inherent in this first and supreme being, because from him alone they can flow. This is in one comprehensive word, what we call good. But good unexercis’d, unemploy’d, incommunicate, is no good, and implies a contradiction, when affirmed of the all-good being. ”

“ When reason is properly employed, she will confirm the documents of nature, which are always true and wholesome; she will distinguish, in the documents of human education, the good from the bad, rejecting the last with modesty, and adhering to the first with reverence. ”

“ And I should like to know whether I may say the same of another proposition—that not life, but a good life, is to be chiefly valued?
Cr. Yes, that also remains unshaken.
Soc. And a good life is equivalent to a just and honourable one—that holds also? ”

“ All the good that God meant for mankind, "all the joys of sense, all the pleasures of reason, lie in three words,—health, peace, and competence." ”

“ On the basis of such ideas,—to please others; to win their good graces and one's own ultimate success; to be sweetly reasonable in conforming xvto custom; to perform every act with an eye to its effect on those about us,—on the basis of ideas as elementary yet appealing as these, he formulates in detail the precepts of conduct for daily human intercourse in a refined society. ”

“ It is therefore of unspeakable Advantage to possess our Minds with an habitual good Intention, and to aim all our Thoughts, Words, and Actions at some laudable End, whether it be the Glory of our Maker, the Good of Mankind, or the Benefit of our own Souls. ”

“ Without doubt this harmony already appears in the visible world, in the natural consequences of good and bad actions, in society which punishes and rewards, in public esteem and con{361}tempt, especially in the troubles and joys of conscience. ”

“ You will hear every day the maxims of a low prudence. You will hear, that the first duty is to get land and money, place and name. ‘What is this Truth you seek? what is this Beauty?’ men will ask, with derision. If, nevertheless, God have called any of you to explore truth and beauty, be bold, be firm, be true. When you shall say, ‘As others do, so will I: I renounce, I am sorry for it, my early visions; I must eat the good of the land,{179} and let learning and romantic expectations go, until a more convenient season;’—then dies the man in you; ”

“ Let your evinced desires be for what is good, and the people will be good. ”

“ Every man depends on the quantity of sense, wit, or good manners he brings into society for the reception he meets with in it. ”

“ Moral experience—the actual possession and exercise of good character—is necessary truly to understand moral principles and profitably to apply them. ”