Motives Quotes

The moment there is suspicion about a person's motives, everything he does becomes tainted.
Mahatma Gandhi

Person, Everything, Moment

Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives.
Oscar Wilde

Stupid, Whenever, Noblest

Look at the means which a man employs, consider his motives, observe his pleasures. A man simply cannot conceal himself!
Confucius

Cannot, Means, Himself

When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives.
Robert A. Heinlein

Government, End, May

Do not ever say that the desire to 'do good' by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.
Ayn Rand

Good, Stupidity, Desire

The moment we begin to fear the opinions of others and hesitate to tell the truth that is in us, and from motives of policy are silent when we should speak, the divine floods of light and life no longer flow into our souls.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Life, Truth, Fear

Our souls may lose their peace and even disturb other people's, if we are always criticizing trivial actions - which often are not real defects at all, but we construe them wrongly through our ignorance of their motives.
Saint Teresa of Avila

Peace, Ignorance, Real

God made man to go by motives, and he will not go without them, any more than a boat without steam or a balloon without gas.
Henry Ward Beecher

God, Made, Boat

A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives - of approving of some and disapproving of others.
Charles Darwin

Past, Others, Moral

But behavior in the human being is sometimes a defense, a way of concealing motives and thoughts, as language can be a way of hiding your thoughts and preventing communication.
Abraham Maslow

Human, Thoughts, Sometimes

We would frequently be ashamed of our good deeds if people saw all of the motives that produced them.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Good, Deeds, Ashamed

We should often feel ashamed of our best actions if the world could see all the motives which produced them.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Best, Often, Actions

We should often blush for our very best actions, if the world did but see all the motives upon which they were done.
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

Best, Done, Often

Actions are visible, though motives are secret.
Samuel Johnson

Secret, Though, Actions

Every woman is supposed to have the same set of motives, or else to be a monster.
George Eliot

Woman, Same, Else

It is futile to judge a kind deed by its motives. Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
Eric Hoffer

Judge, Kindness, Made

The vanity of being known to be trusted with a secret is generally one of the chief motives to disclose it.
Samuel Johnson

Secret, Known, Vanity

Heroes are those who can somehow resist the power of the situation and act out of noble motives, or behave in ways that do not demean others when they easily can.
Philip Zimbardo

Power, Others, Act

People have motives and thoughts of which they are unaware.
Albert Ellis

Thoughts, Unaware

The beginning of self-knowledge: recognizing that your motives are the same as other people's.
Mason Cooley

Same, Beginning

Never ascribe to an opponent motives meaner than your own.
James M. Barrie

Opponent, Ascribe, Meaner

Social improvement is attained more readily by a concern with the quality of results than with the purity of motives.
Eric Hoffer

Social, Quality, Results

People's behavior makes sense if you think about it in terms of their goals, needs, and motives.
Thomas Mann

Sense, Makes, Behavior

Naturally, it is a terrible, despicable crime when, as in Munich, people are taken hostage, people are killed. But probing the motives of those responsible and showing that they are also individuals with families and have their own story does not excuse what they did.
Steven Spielberg

Story, Taken, Crime

A lot of times people's main motives and plan in life is to hurt as many people as they can, but I think there's enough good people that help make the world a good place.
Tina Yothers

Life, Good, Hurt

No period of history has ever been great or ever can be that does not act on some sort of high, idealistic motives, and idealism in our time has been shoved aside, and we are paying the penalty for it.
Alfred North Whitehead

Time, Great, History

Every diminution of the public burdens arising from taxation gives to individual enterprise increased power and furnishes to all the members of our happy confederacy new motives for patriotic affection and support.
Andrew Jackson

Power, Happy, Support

Living en famille provides the strongest motives for rudeness combined with the maximum opportunity for displaying it.
Quentin Crisp

Living, Rudeness, Strongest

I couldn't be happier that President Bush has stood up for having served in the National Guard, because I can finally put an end to all those who questioned my motives for enlisting in the Army Reserve at the height of the Vietnam War.
Larry David

One principle I've been fighting for that doesn't endear me to a lot of people is that black people can be just as complicated and screwed up as white people. Our motives can be just as base and violent. Suffering does not necessarily ennoble you.
Henry Louis Gates

Black, Fighting, Suffering

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