quotations about honor
Thou art a fellow of a good respect;
Thy life hath had some smatch of honour in it.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Julius Caesar
One cannot seek to uphold honor in a being that has none.
CHARLES DE LINT
Moonheart
Honour is unstable and seldom the same; for she feeds upon opinion, and is as fickle as her food.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Honor is self-esteem made visible in action.
AYN RAND
The Ayn Rand Letter, Jan. 14, 1974
Worldly honor hath also its grace, and the power of overcoming, and of mastery; whence springs also the thirst of revenge. But yet, to obtain all these, we may not depart from Thee, O Lord, nor decline from Thy law.
ST. AUGUSTINE
Confessions
Honor is honor; but gold and silver are not honor.
PHERECYDES
attributed, Day's Collacon
There are no perfectly honorable men; but every true man has one main point of honor and a few minor ones.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
Maxims for Revolutionists
Honour is purchas'd by the deeds we do.
CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
Hero and Leander
Virtue is the fount whence honour springs.
CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
Tamburlaine the Great
How loosely do honors sit upon men when every disease shakes them off and lays them in the dust.
H. KING
attributed, Day's Collacon
Honor is immortal.
PERIANDER
attributed, Day's Collacon
Honor appears to me to be an object of great importance, since men submit to every kind of labor, and undergo every sort of danger, with the desire of attaining it.
XENOPHON
Hiero
One can aim at honor both as one ought, and more than one ought, and less than one ought. He whose craving for honor is excessive is said to be ambitious, and he who is deficient in this respect unambitious; while he who observes the mean has no peculiar name.
ARISTOTLE
Nicomachean Ethics
See that you come
Not to woo honour, but to wed it.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
All's Well That Ends Well
Honor is the only really good disguise for an occasional act of dishonor.
TAD WILLIAMS
Otherland: City of Golden Shadow
When honor comes to you, be ready to take it;
But reach not to seize it before it is near.
JOHN BOYLE O'REILLY
"Rules of the Road"
Honor is infinitely more valuable than positions of honor.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG
"Golden Notebook", The Waste Books
We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.
C. S. LEWIS
The Abolition of Man
For honour travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Troilus and Cressida
Better to die ten thousand deaths, than wound my honour.
JOSEPH ADDISON
Cato