Integrity

“ This, sir, they have borne without much uneasiness, and have contented themselves with the consciousness of doing right, in expectation that truth and integrity must at last prevail, and that the prudence of their conduct and success of their measures would at last evince the justice of their intentions. ”

“ Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful. I have found in thee all the qualities requisite for trust, benevolence, experience, and fortitude. ”

“ A life of honesty, integrity, righteousness, in all we do, is not only policy or wisdom in respect to the world to come, but it is the best policy or highest wisdom in all the affairs of this life. It secures the best results because it makes use of the best means to promote our own happiness here, and the happiness of all within the sphere of our influence. ”

“ Help me establish a new integrity on our thinking, in our words, in our deeds. Let us be men, as the best of our breed have tried to be. Let us be true to ourselves so that we cannot be false to any man or any people. ”

“ How low an opinion I had of human wisdom and integrity when I was truly informed of the springs and motives of great enterprises and revolutions in the world, and of the contemptible accidents to which they owed their success! ”

“ Third, were we truly men of integrity – men who never ran out on either the principles in which they believed or the people who believed in them – men who believed in us – men whom neither financial gain nor political ambition could ever divert from the fulfillment of our sacred trust? ”

“ Well, these are essentials: it asks for broad and ample strength to lean upon without misgiving. It demands an integrity that may be trusted to the uttermost, beyond the bounds where prudence, discretion, and kindred virtues cry halt. It asks the frankness and transparency of soul where nothing is hidden, and where there are no dark corners, suspicious and unreadable, suggestive of things to be disguised with care. ”

“ You birds look at your objective integrity as if it were all there is to virtue. It's not. Listen, Paulo. There are two functions of virtue: one is to find new truths; the other is to dispel old lies; the whole man practices both, equally. ”

“ It is vain to boast of our integrity unless we can make it out that by the grace of God we have walked in our integrity, and that our conversation in the world has been in simplicity and godly sincerity. ”

“ What degree of integrity should be reasonably required, let me ask, of a person in the service of the public, occupying a responsible position like that of a post master? upon whose fidelity depend the prompt and safe transaction of business, and the security of many other interests of social life. Will a valetudinarian virtue answer the purpose? a virtue strong against weak temptations, but weak against strong ones? The man whose principles cannot withstand every degree of enticement to dishonesty, is unfit for any place of trust. ”

“ A patience which is grand; a brave and cold neglect of the offices which prudence exacts, so it be done in a deep upper piety; a consent to solitude and inaction, which proceeds out of an unwillingness to violate character, is the century which makes the gem. Whilst therefore I desire to express the respect and joy I feel before this sublime connection of reforms, now in their infancy around us, I urge the more earnestly the paramount duties of self-reliance. I cannot find language of sufficient energy to convey my sense of the sacredness of private integrity. ”

“ Integrity, as a living and governing principle, rises above the person of him who is animated by it, and regards this person as standing under a definite law,—as existing only for a certain purpose, and as means to a higher end. Man shall be and do something ”

“ Integrity, however, is very much broader than the above illustration would indicate. Integrity applies to many more things than to money. Integrity requires the seeking after, as well as the dispensing of, truth. It was this desire for truth which founded our educational institutions, our sciences and our arts. All the great professions, from medicine to engineering, rest upon this spirit of integrity. Only as they so rest, can they prosper or even survive. ”

“ He may bring so much virtue, so much justice, so much integrity to the place, as shall spoil the place, burthen the place; his integrity may be a libel upon his predecessor and cast an infamy upon him, and a burthen upon his successor to proceed by example, and to bring the place itself to an undervalue and the market to an uncertainty. ”

“ Stop, rather, and fortify your uprightness on the broad grounds, “that honesty is not only the deepest policy, but the highest wisdom; since however difficult it may be for integrity to get on, it is a thousand times more difficult for knavery to get off.” ”

“ Against these prejudices, which their sagacity enabled them to foresee, their integrity incited them to secure us, by provisions which every man then thought equitable and wise, because no man was then hired to espouse a contrary opinion. ”

“ Judges ought to be more learned, than witty, more reverend, than plausible, and more advised, than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue. ”

“ In contemplating the nature and effects of artifice, or rather that system of practising upon others which I have endeavoured to describe, and in reflecting upon the state of mind which this species of practising indicates, we arrive at a more clear and decided idea of integrity, as directly opposed to this system, than we can by any other process of thought. There is in fact no means of giving a positive definition of integrity, so as to make it fully understood. ”

“ I believe that the only way in which we. can hope to carry forward our civilization, or even keep it from retrograding, is jealously to guard the integrity of the individual, and to make the temple of the mind so sacred that neither law nor custom shall be able to enter and enslave. ”

“ Now, this is a subject of the utmost importance—to maintain truth and integrity upon all points. Be not double-minded in any degree, but faithfully maintain, not only the upright principle on religious ground, but also the brightest honour, according to the maxims of the world. ”

“ This spirit of scientific directness, and economy of thought and trouble by making the principle of integrity the basis of all forms, and cutting all ethical theories down to "be good because you ought," is rapidly astonishing us with another marvellous fact which it illustrates, namely, that as in this axiom—as in man himself—there are latent undiscovered powers, so in a thousand other sayings, or things known to us all, used by us all, and regarded as common-place, there are astounding novelties and capacities as yet undreamed of. ”

“ Thorough honesty and plain undeviating integrity—these are our real needs; on these substructions only can the fabric of individual or national well-being safely be reared. ‘Other foundation can no man lay.’ Common men, who, in their petty daily acts, maintain these ordinary unostentatious [Pg 412] truths, are the real benefactors of mankind, the real pillars of the State, are the apostles and champions of—something not to be named within a few pages of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, the Solidarity of the Peoples, and the Universal Republic. ”

“ Let truth bear sway, and true integrity shed a charm around your whole being. Rise up for the right in the strength of your own ability. God has bestowed upon you the power to reject the evil and receive the truth ”

“ If you tread as cautiously as the strictest rectitude can guide you, you must suffer from this. But if you are armed with truth and conscious integrity, you will be sure of the plaudits and countenance of the good. ”

“ The motives are disclosed, the purposes are conjectured, and that opinion is finally accepted which seems to be, not the best founded in law, perhaps, but the best founded in integrity of character and of morals. That is the process which is slowly working its will upon the world; and what we should be watchful of is not so much jealous interests as sound principles of action. ”

“ The third condition is integrity—not that lower form which refuses to tell a downright falsehood, but that higher form of conscientiousness which will not swerve a hair's breadth from the strictest truth, no matter what the temptation; the courage to lose a sale rather than to do that which is mean or questionable. ”

“ There is no doubt that all that is true and important about any virtue—integrity, for instance—may be said in the form of a lecture, or written in a chapter of moral philosophy; but the faithful history of an upright man, his sayings and doings, his trials, his sorrows, his triumphs and rewards, teaches the same truths in a more effectual as well as more popular form. ”

“ The faculties of the mind, if they have not then attained to their highest maturity, are in full vigour, and hastening towards their ripest state. The judgment, acting upon large materials, has, by that time, attained a solid cast; and the principles, which form the character, and the integrity, which gives lustre to the virtues of life, must then, if ever, have acquired public confidence and approbation. ”

“ The true life of a nation is in its personal morality, and no excellence of constitution and laws can avail much if the people lack purity and integrity. Culture, art, refinement, care for our own comfort and that of others, are all well, but truth, honor, reverence, and fidelity to duty are indispensable. ”

“ That reply is, that on a great moral and political, as well as legal question,—a question that connects itself with ethics, as well as with partisan politics, and the success of old parties or the formation of new ones,—integrity is as necessary to the formation of a sound opinion as intelligence. ”

“ For though, while in obeying our fallible conscience, we have thus failed to bring our whole outward action in the case into harmony with full duty, or have even done what to others about us or to God above us was wrong, we have maintained our own subjective personal moral integrity, in maintaining that which is the fundamental and essential element of all morality, the right intention and effort. ”

“ I. The guidance of integrity is the safest under which we can be placed. Perfect immunity from danger is not to be expected in this life. But let us inquire who the persons are that, in all the different lines of life, have gone through the world with most success, and we shall find that the men of probity and honour form by far the most considerable part of the list; that men of plain understanding, acting upon fair and direct views, have much oftener prospered than men of the deepest policy, who were devoid of principle. ”

“ There are, sir, men, I know, to whom this panegyrick will seem romantick and chimerical, men, to whom integrity and conscience are idle sounds, men, who are content to catch the word of their leader, who have no sense of the obligation of any law but the supreme will of him that pays them, and who know not any virtue but diligence in attendance, and readiness in obedience. ”

“ Truth and the keeping of one's word and promise are the basis of credit and esteem on which are founded and built up friendly intercourse and confidence. This is required, and is the more necessary for great ones, and those who have important public duties, because on their truth and integrity depend faith and public safety. Be sure that in this you take great care and pains, that it should be known and understood everywhere that trust may be placed in what you say, as besides its affecting public matters and your appointment, it matters much to your own honour and esteem. ”

“ Truth will in the long run prevail; in the mean while you have a powerful shield in the correctness of your conduct through life, and the integrity with which you have performed the important duties of your present station. ”

“ With vast masses of people it has become perilously like a conviction that strict integrity, while good and desirable as an ideal, is yet too much of a risk for the purpose of what is popularly known as practical life. ”

“ We want righteousness and truth and equity and honor and integrity, and men to be governed by correct principles, and to seek the well-being of the people they live among and rule over. And who are these men they are now prosecuting and persecuting? ”

“ HABITS OF SELF-DENIAL.—Form in the child habits of self-denial. Pampering never matures good character.
4. EMPHASIZE INTEGRITY.—Keep the moral tissues tough in integrity; then it will hold a hook of obligations when once set in a sure place. There is nothing more vital. Shape all your experiments to preserve the integrity. Do not so reward it that it becomes mercenary. Turning State's evidence is a dangerous experiment in morals. Prevent deceit from succeeding. ”

“ Our policies must be premised on and must reinforce values such as family, hard work, integrity, personal responsibility. ”

“ Without a vain profession of integrity, which in these times might justly be suspected, I shall shew myself in effect a friend to the interests of my countrymen, and leave it to them to determine, whether I am moved by a personal malevolence to three private gentlemen, or merely by a hope of perplexing the Ministry, or whether I am animated by a just and honourable purpose of obtaining a satisfaction to the laws of this country, equal, if possible, to the violation they have suffered. ”

“ Whether he be a king, a magistrate, a priest, a judge, a merchant, a tradesman, a mechanic, a labourer, a soldier, or a seaman, each one has a duty to perform in society; and whosoever conducts himself in his proper sphere of life with integrity and sincerity, as above stated, free from all fraud and deceit, such an one is in the exercise of genuine charity, and all his actions are good works. ”