Ought Quotes

All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.
James Madison

Men, Power, Degree

A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation.
Joseph Addison

True, Rather, Worth

If we must not act save on a certainty, we ought not to act on religion, for it is not certain. But how many things we do on an uncertainty, sea voyages, battles!
Blaise Pascal

Religion, Sea, Act

It is true that a fellow cannot ignore women - but he can think of them as he ought - as sisters, not as sparring partners.
Jim Elliot

Women, True, Ignore

All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.
Alexis de Tocqueville

War, Nation, Means

What one has, one ought to use: and whatever he does he should do with all his might.
Marcus Tullius Cicero

Whatever, Might

There are two freedoms - the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where he is free to do what he ought.
Charles Kingsley

True, Two, Free

Kindness goes a long ways lots of times when it ought to stay at home.
Kin Hubbard

Home, Kindness, Long

We are not about to send American boys 9 or 10 thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.
Lyndon B. Johnson

Home, Away, American

When it is not in our power to follow what is true, we ought to follow what is most probable.
Rene Descartes

Power, True, Follow

Judges ought to be more leaned than witty, more reverent than plausible, and more advised than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue.
Francis Bacon

Integrity, Virtue, Above

I'm proof against that word failure. I've seen behind it. The only failure a man ought to fear is failure of cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.
George Eliot

Best, Fear, Failure

A husband who submits to his wife's yoke is justly held an object of ridicule. A woman's influence ought to be entirely concealed.
Honore de Balzac

Husband, Wife, Woman

One ought to look a good deal at oneself before thinking of condemning others.
Moliere

Good, Thinking, Before

An affair now and then is good for a marriage. It adds spice, stops it from getting boring... I ought to know.
Bette Davis

Marriage, Good, Boring

I think there ought to be a club in which preachers and journalists could come together and have the sentimentalism of the one matched with the cynicism of the other. That ought to bring them pretty close to the truth.
Reinhold Niebuhr

Truth, Together, Pretty

In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.
Rene Descartes

Mind, Learn, Less

Teach and practice, practice and teach - that is all we have; that is all we are good for; that is all we ever ought to do.
Ernest Holmes

Good, Practice, Teach

Life being very short, and the quiet hours of it few, we ought to waste none of them in reading valueless books.
John Ruskin

Life, Short, Few

True guilt is guilt at the obligation one owes to oneself to be oneself. False guilt is guilt felt at not being what other people feel one ought to be or assume that one is.
R. D. Laing

True, Felt, Guilt

There are so many things about which some old man ought to tell one while one is little; for when one is grown one would know them as a matter of course.
Rainer Maria Rilke

Old, Tell, Matter

The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.
James Madison

Men, Power, Truth

The woman who can't influence her husband to vote the way she wants ought to be ashamed of herself.
E. M. Forster

Husband, Woman, Vote

It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation.
Jane Austen

Nation, Rest, Found

We are much beholden to Machiavel and others, that write what men do, and not what they ought to do.
Francis Bacon

Men, Others, Write

Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Gratitude, Expect, Duty

A wise man sees as much as he ought, not as much as he can.
Michel de Montaigne

I think we ought to raise the age at which juveniles can have a gun.
George W. Bush

Age, Gun, Raise

The greatest obstacle to being heroic is the doubt whether one may not be going to prove one's self a fool; the truest heroism is to resist the doubt; and the profoundest wisdom, to know when it ought to be resisted, and when it be obeyed.
Nathaniel Hawthorne

Wisdom, Fool, Greatest

A man ought to read just as inclination leads him, for what he reads as a task will do him little good.
Samuel Johnson

Good, Him, Read

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