Cardinal Virtues Quotes

Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.

Peace, though beloved of our Lord, is a cardinal virtue only if your neighbors share your conscience.

Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.

Pride is one of the seven deadly sins; but it cannot be the pride of a mother in her children, for that is a compound of two cardinal virtues — faith and hope.

Men think that self-sacrifice is the most charming of all the cardinal virtues for women, and in order to keep it in healthy working order, they make opportunities for its illustration as often as possible.

The act of defending any of the cardinal virtues has today all the exhilaration of a vice.

To this war of every man against every man, this also in consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have there no place. Where there is no common power, there is no law, where no law, no injustice. Force, and fraud, are in war the cardinal virtues.

The Stoics adopted the Socratic division of cardinal virtues into wisdom, justice, courage, and moderation.

There is something which unites magic and applied science (technology) while separating them from the "wisdom" of earlier ages. For the wise men of old, the cardinal problem of human life was how to conform the soul to objective reality, and the solution was wisdom, self-discipline, and virtue. For the modern, the cardinal problem is how to conform reality to the wishes of man, and the solution is a technique.

Freemasonry also celebrates the four cardinal virtues of Greek philosophy, which correspond symbolically with the four corners of the lodge: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.

A cardinal American virtue, 'ambition,' promotes a cardinal American vice, 'deviant behavior.

Everyone suspects themselves of at least one of the cardinal virtues...

The cardinal virtues are self-control, moderation, kindness, generosity, justice, and truthfulness tempered by discretion

[The five cardinal virtues of the Chinese are (1) humanity or benevolence; (2) uprightness of mind; (3) self-respect, self- control, or "proper feeling;" (4) wisdom; (5) sincerity or good faith.

The Four Virtues―Honest towards ourselves and whoever else is a friend to us: brave towards the enemy; magnanimous towards the defeated; polite―always: such do the four cardinal virtues wish us to be.

Capitalism is based on self-interest and self-esteem; it holds integrity and trustworthiness as cardinal virtues and makes them pay off in the marketplace, thus demanding that men survive by means of virtues, not of vices.

Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.

Capitalism is based on self-interest and self-esteem; it holds integrity and trustworthiness as cardinal virtues and makes them pay off in the marketplace, thus demanding that men survive by means of virtue, not vices. It is this superlatively moral system that the welfare statists propose to improve upon by means of preventative law, snooping bureaucrats, and the chronic goad of fear.

We could not learn love in the abstract any more than we could learn patience and the other cardinal virtues. Just as we cannot know the "fellowship of his sufferings" without suffering, we also come to know real fellowship with our fellowmen only by serving them.

Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrées

Do not live by certain fixed rules, except those that relate to the cardinal virtues. Nor let your will subscribe fixed conditions, for you may have to drink the water to-morrow which you cast away to-day.

While I remained ambitious, punctual, and hedonistic at home, I had learned to better appreciate the timeless beauties and blessings of nature, to value sincerity as a cardinal virtue and reject the Western reverence for affectation and hypocrisy, and to make my frantic life pause for sunrises, sunsets, and full moons.

To be just meaans to recognize the other as other; it means to give acknowledgment even where one cannot love... A just man is just, therefore, because he sanctions another person in his very separateness and helps him to receive his due.

Today, you can pick your own news. At no time has the world been this compatible with apathy.

Human activity has two basic forms: doing (agere) and making (facere). Artifacts, technical and artistic, are the "works" of making. We ourselves are the "works" of doing.

Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession of a good chef ... Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees...

If in this supreme test, in face of which the braggart falls silent and every heroic gesture is paralyzed, a man walks straight up to the cause of his fear and is not deterred from doing that which is good -- which ultimately means for the sake of God, and therefore not from ambition or from fear of being taken for a coward -- this man, and he alone, is truly brave.

...Enduring comprises a strong activity of the soul, namely, a vigorous grasping of and clinging to the good; and only from this stout-hearted activity can the strength to support the physical and spiritual suffering of injury and death be nourished.

Somewhere in “The Great Gatsby” (which was my “Tom Sawyer” when I was twelve), the youthful narrator remarks that everybody suspects himself of having at least one of the cardinal virtues, and he goes on to say that he thinks his, bless his heart, is honesty. Mine, I think, is that I know the difference between a mystical story and a love story. I say that my current offering isn’t a mystical story, or a religiously mystify-ing story, at all. I say it’s a compound, or multiple, love story, pure and complicated.

There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the wisdom of earlier ages. for the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue.

The brave man uses wrath for his own act, above all in attack, 'for it is peculiar to wrath to pounce upon evil. Thus fortitude and wrath work directly upon each other.

These were called ‘cardinal’ virtues because they are, as we should say, ‘pivotal’.) They are PRUDENCE, TEMPERANCE, JUSTICE and FORTITUDE.

Pride is one of the seven deadly sins; but it cannot be the pride of a mother in her children, for that is a compound of two cardinal virtues—faith and hope.

Technology, access, success, power, privilege—this is only a blessing when accompanied by the second of the cardinal virtues: self-restraint.

obedience to divine authority, not reverence for human life, was the cardinal virtue.

Justice is the cardinal virtue of peace.

What moral to draw? Peace, though beloved of our Lord, is a cardinal virtue only if your neighbors share your conscience.

According to the “Cult of True Womanhood,” a popular phrase during those years, a true woman possessed four cardinal virtues: piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity.

The Cardinal virtue is to obey God's commandments .

Peace, though beloved of our Lord, is a cardinal virtue only if your neighbours share your conscience.

Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues.

Her gray, sun-strained eyes stared straight ahead, but she had deliberately shifted our relations, and for a moment I thought I loved her. But I am slow-thinking and full of interior rules that act as brakes on my desires, and I knew that I had to get myself definitely out of that tangle back home. I'd been writing letters once a week and signing them: "Love, Nick," and all I could think of was how, when a certain girl played tennis, a faint mustache of perspiration appeared on her upper lip. Nevertheless there was a vague understanding that had to be tactfully broken off before I was free. Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people I have ever known.

virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble.

...the intemperately wrathful man is less obnoxious than the intemperately lustful one, while the immoderate pleasure-seeker, intent on dissimulation and camouflage, is unable to give or take a straight look in the eye.

Temperance is, unfortunately, one of those words that has changed its meaning. It now usually means teetotalism. But in the days when the second Cardinal virtue was christened “Temperance,” it meant nothing of the sort.

There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the ‘wisdom’ of earlier ages. For the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. For magic and applied science alike the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice of this technique, are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious—such as digging up and mutilating the dead.

How like God's love yours has been to me- so wise, so generous, and so unsparing!" exclaimed Pancratius. "Promise me one thing more- that is, that you will stay near to me to the end, and carry my last legacy to my mother.

The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble

Finally, it is no longer completely fantastic to think that a day may come when not the executioners alone will deny the inalienable rights of men, but when even the victims will not be able to say why it is that they are suffering injustice.

The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble.

It made no difference to me. Dishonesty in a woman is a thing you never blame deeply—I was casually sorry, and then I forgot. It was on that same house party that we had a curious conversation about driving a car. It started because she passed so close to some workmen that our fender flicked a button on one man’s coat. “You’re a rotten driver,” I protested. “Either you ought to be more careful, or you oughtn’t to drive at all.” “I am careful.” “No, you’re not.” “Well, other people are,” she said lightly. “What’s that got to do with it?” “They’ll keep out of my way,” she insisted. “It takes two to make an accident.” “Suppose you met somebody just as careless as yourself.” “I hope I never will,” she answered. “I hate careless people. That’s why I like you.” Her gray, sun-strained eyes stared straight ahead, but she had deliberately shifted our relations, and for a moment I thought I loved her. But I am slow-thinking and full of interior rules that act as brakes on my desires, and I knew that first I had to get myself definitely out of that tangle back home. I’d been writing letters once a week and signing them: “Love, Nick,” and all I could think of was how, when that certain girl played tennis, a faint mustache of perspiration appeared on her upper lip. Nevertheless there was a vague understanding that had to be tactfully broken off before I was free. Every one suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known.

Perhaps when all the consequences of a false presupposition suddenly becomes a direct threat mean in their great terror will become aware that it is no longer possible to call back to true and effective life a truth they have allowed to become remote --- just for the sake of their bare survival.

Because societies are trusted to be meritocratic, financial achievements are understood to be deserved. The ability to accumulate wealth is prized for reflecting the presence of atleast four cardinal virtues: creativity, courage, intelligence and stamina. The presence of other virtues - humility and godliness - rarely detains attention. Achievements are not attributed, as in past societies, to luck or providence - a reflection of modern societies' faith in individual willpower. Financial failures are similarly judged to be merited, with unemployment bearing some of the shame of physical cowardice in warrior eras.

Virtue is a form or expertise or skill, the knowledge of how to live well in every way which shapes the whole personality. Virtue is analysed in terms of four generic or cardinal virtues: wisdom, courage, self-control or moderation, and justice, seen either as four aspects of a single form of knowledge or as interdependent.

As Hobbes remarked, in war, force and fraud are the cardinal virtues, and he regarded international relations as always potentially a condition of war. Cavour, one of the creators of a united Italy in the nineteenth century, is reported as remarking: ‘What scoundrels we would be if we had done for ourselves what we have done for our country.

Justice means much more than the sort of thing that goes on in law courts.

For the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue.

Pride is one of the seven deadly sins; but it cannot be the pride of a mother in her children, for that is a compound of two cardinal virtues—faith and hope. This was the pride which swelled Mrs. Nickleby's heart that night, and this it was which left upon her face, glistening in the light when they returned home, traces of the most grateful tears she had ever shed.

Of two quite lofty things, measure and moderation, it is best never to speak. A few know their force and significance, from the mysterious paths of inner experiences and conversions: they honor in them something quite godlike, and are afraid to speak aloud. All the rest hardly listen when they are spoken about, and think the subjects under discussion are tedium and mediocrity.

[The five cardinal virtues of the Chinese are (1) humanity or benevolence; (2) uprightness of mind; (3) self-respect, self-control, or “proper feeling;” (4) wisdom; (5) sincerity or good faith. Here “wisdom” and “sincerity” are put before “humanity or benevolence,” and the two military virtues of “courage” and “strictness” substituted for “uprightness of mind” and “self-respect, self-control, or ‘proper feeling.’”]

The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble. Stoicism teaches that we can’t control or rely on anything outside what Epictetus called our “reasoned choice”—our ability to use our reason to choose how we categorize, respond, and reorient ourselves to external events.

The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage , justice , and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things— rather than the things themselves— that cause most of our trouble. Stoicism teaches that we can’t control or rely on anything outside what Epictetus called our “reasoned choice”— our ability to use our reason to choose how we categorize, respond, and reorient ourselves to external events.

The fact that the scientist has succeeded where the magician failed has put such a wide contrast between them in popular thought that the real story of the birth of Science is misunderstood. You will even find people who write about the sixteenth century as if Magic were a medieval survival and Science the new thing that came in to sweep it away. Those who have studied the period know better. There was very little magic in the Middle Ages: the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are the high noon of magic. The serious magical endeavour and the serious scientific endeavour are twins: one was sickly and died, the other strong and throve. But they were twins. They were born of the same impulse. I allow that some (certainly not all) of the early scientists were actuated by a pure love of knowledge. But if we consider the temper of that age as a whole we can discern the impulse of which I speak. There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the ‘wisdom’ of earlier ages. For the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. For magic and applied science alike the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice of this technique, are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious—such as digging up and mutilating the dead. If we compare the chief trumpeter of the new era (Bacon) with Marlowe's Faustus, the similarity is striking.

Duke If you are poor, Are you not blessed in that? Why, poverty Is one of the Christian virtues, [Turns to the Cardinal.] Is it not? I know, Lord Cardinal, you have great revenues, Rich abbey-lands, and tithes, and large estates For preaching voluntary poverty.

I look around and see that many — not all, but many — problems we've got could be solved if our culture simply fostered the habit of reading. Reading books of science, philosophy, history. Reading literature of quality, the sort that touches us because of a more profound reason, such as, for instance, because it's got something to say beyond all the futilities and trifles of life, even while depicting the ordinary in life, at the same time that it says it with style, in a unique, admirable manner. An original one. We are not a county of readers, notwithstanding. We are the country of football turned into a cult, of guile being ranked high as a cardinal virtue, of Carnival made for exportation. A country where there are more letters in political party acronyms than in all many of our politicians have written in a lifetime. A country where ethics has become a joke theme. Where democracy is but a ridiculous puppet theatre. Yes, I look around and see that many problems could be solved if we had the habit of reading. But I am not even sure whether there is someone reading these words.

Within a few centuries, the new capitalist spirit challenged the basic Christian ethic: the boundless ego of Sir Gales Overreach and his fellows in the marketplace had no room for charity or love in any of their ancient senses. The capitalist scheme of values in fact transformed five of the seven deadly sins of Christianity-pride, envy, greed, avarice, and lust-into positive social virtues, treating them as necessary incentives to all economic enterprise; while the cardinal virtues, beginning with love and humility, were rejected as 'bad for business,' except in the degree that they made the working class more docile and more amenable to cold-blooded exploitation.

Stoicism was a school of philosophy founded in Athens by Zeno of Citium in the early third century BC. Its name is derived from the Greek stoa, meaning porch, because that’s where Zeno first taught his students. The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble. Stoicism teaches that we can’t control or rely on anything outside what Epictetus called our “reasoned choice”—our ability to use our reason to choose how we categorize, respond, and reorient ourselves to external events.

FROM GREECE TO ROME TO TODAY Stoicism was a school of philosophy founded in Athens by Zeno of Citium in the early third century BC. Its name is derived from the Greek stoa, meaning porch, because that’s where Zeno first taught his students. The philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble. Stoicism teaches that we can’t control or rely on anything outside what Epictetus called our “reasoned choice”—our ability to use our reason to choose how we categorize, respond, and reorient ourselves to external events.

Now, to be sure, Mrs Varden thought, here is a perfect character. Here is a meek, righteous, thoroughgoing Christian, who, having mastered all these qualities, so difficult of attainment; who, having dropped a pinch of salt on the tails of all the cardinal virtues, and caught them everyone; makes light of their possession, and pants for more morality. For the good woman never doubted (as many good men and women never do), that this slighting kind of profession, this setting so little store by great matters, this seeming to say, ‘I am not proud, I am what you hear, but I consider myself no better than other people; let us change the subject, pray’—was perfectly genuine and true. He so contrived it, and said it in that way that it appeared to have been forced from him, and its effect was marvellous. Aware of the impression he had made—few men were quicker than he at such discoveries—Mr Chester followed up the blow by propounding certain virtuous maxims, somewhat vague and general in their nature, doubtless, and occasionally partaking of the character of truisms, worn a little out at elbow, but delivered in so charming a voice and with such uncommon serenity and peace of mind, that they answered as well as the best. Nor is this to be wondered at; for as hollow vessels produce a far more musical sound in falling than those which are substantial, so it will oftentimes be found that sentiments which have nothing in them make the loudest ringing in the world, and are the most relished.

If we analyse the classes of life, we readily find that there are three cardinal classes which are radically distinct in function. A short analysis will disclose to us that, though minerals have various activities, they are not "living." The plants have a very definite and well known function-the transformation of solar energy into organic chemical energy. They are a class of life which appropriates one kind of energy, converts it into another kind and stores it up; in that sense they are a kind of storage battery for the solar energy; and so I define THE PLANTS AS THE CHEMISTRY-BINDING class of life. The animals use the highly dynamic products of the chemistry-binding class-the plants-as food, and those products-the results of plant-transformation-undergo in animals a further transformation into yet higher forms; and the animals are correspondingly a more dynamic class of life; their energy is kinetic; they have a remarkable freedom and power which the plants do not possess-I mean the freedom and faculty to move about in space; and so I define ANIMALS AS THE SPACE-BINDING CLASS OF LIFE. And now what shall we say of human beings? What is to be our definition of Man? Like the animals, human beings do indeed possess the space-binding capacity but, over and above that, human beings possess a most remarkable capacity which is entirely peculiar to them-I mean the capacity to summarise, digest and appropriate the labors and experiences of the past; I mean the capacity to use the fruits of past labors and experiences as intellectual or spiritual capital for developments in the present; I mean the capacity to employ as instruments of increasing power the accumulated achievements of the all-precious lives of the past generations spent in trial and error, trial and success; I mean the capacity of human beings to conduct their lives in the ever increasing light of inherited wisdom; I mean the capacity in virtue of which man is at once the heritor of the by-gone ages and the trustee of posterity. And because humanity is just this magnificent natural agency by which the past lives in the present and the present for the future, I define HUMANITY, in the universal tongue of mathematics and mechanics, to be the TIME-BINDING CLASS OF LIFE.

This is the cardinal virtue of an Objective narrative. Given its timeless nature, there is no need to assemble it with rackets and ruses. With the envy of eunuchs and ingenuity fanned by resentment, men incapable of profound insights deny the Objective nature of the written word in the despairing hope of dissuading those who know the Truth and have the courage to write it. I, Petronius Jablonski, hereby forbid any and all Freudian, structural, post-structural, post-post-structural, post-colonial, post-anything analysis or deconstruction of my annals and condemn any and all such enterprises. All theorizing based on class, gender, and ethnicity is strictly prohibited. An Objective narrative is not a Rorschach blot for one to project his pathologies and sundry whines. If the Reader insists on “reading into” the narrative, he should fill the margins with sketches of penises, vaginas, and stick-figures engaged in coitus.

Stoic virtues are sometimes referred to as the four cardinal virtues: Practical wisdom (prudence) Moderation (temperance) Courage (fortitude) Integrity (justice) However, each of them individually is not considered a virtue. They may be thought of as traits or dispositions that strengthen and ennoble humankind but must be used together so one does not override the others. The Stoics sought after ethical notions and solid principles. They came up with eight principles to form the foundation for living a good life[VM10]. These principles have been used by people from all walks of life and can help you achieve your goals. Nature is rational. Illness, poverty, and death are not evil; they are natural. A life following rational nature is virtuous. Passion is irrational (apatheia). Wisdom is the root of all virtue. The universe is governed by a law of reason. Pleasure is neither good nor bad. Virtue should be sought as a matter of duty, not for pleasure.

There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the wisdom of earlier ages. for the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. for magic and applied science alike the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice of this technique, are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious—such as digging up and mutilating the dead.

To understand our faith -- to theologize in the Catholic tradition -- we need philosophy. We must use the philosophical language of God, person, creation, relationship, identity, natural law, virtues, conscience, moral norms if we are to think about religion and defend it. Theology has some terms and methods of its own, but its fundamental tools are borrowed from philosophy. The growth of religious fundamentalism and the collapse of religious education mean theology is more urgently needed in universities -- especially Catholic ones -- than ever before.

Muslim scholars have identified four essential qualities in human beings, which have been identified in earlier traditions as well. Imam al-Ghazālī and Fakhruddīn al-Rāzī adopted them, as did Imam Rāghib al-Isfahānī in his book on ethics. According to Imam al-Ghazālī, the first of them is quwwat al-ʿilm, known in Western tradition as the rational soul, which is human capacity to learn. The next one, quwwat al-ghaḍab, which may be called the irascible soul, is the capacity that relates to human emotion and anger. The third element, quwwat alshahwah, known as the concupiscent soul, is related to appetite and desire. The fourth power, quwwat al-ʿadl, harmonizes the previous three powers and keeps them in balance so that no one capacity overtakes and suppresses the others. In Western tradition, these capacities correspond to what is known as cardinal virtues. Muslims call them ummahāt al-faḍā’il. They are wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice (ḥikmah, shajāʿah, ʿiffah, and ʿadl). When the rational soul is balanced, the result is wisdom. Whoever is given wisdom has been given much good (QUR’AN , 2:269). Wisdom, according to Imam al-Ghazālī, is found in one who is balanced, who is neither a simpleton nor a shrewd, tricky person. If there is a deficit in the rational soul, the result is foolishness. When the rational soul becomes excessive and inordinately dominant, the result is trickery and the employment of the intellect toward the exploitation of others.

It is a science," said Don Quixote, "that comprehends in itself all or most of the sciences in the world, for he who professes it must be a jurist, and must know the rules of justice, distributive and equitable, so as to give to each one what belongs to him and is due to him. He must be a theologian, so as to be able to give a clear and distinctive reason for the Christian faith he professes, wherever it may be asked of him. He must be a physician, and above all a herbalist, so as in wastes and solitudes to know the herbs that have the property of healing wounds, for a knight-errant must not go looking for some one to cure him at every step. He must be an astronomer, so as to know by the stars how many hours of the night have passed, and what clime and quarter of the world he is in. He must know mathematics, for at every turn some occasion for them will present itself to him; and, putting it aside that he must be adorned with all the virtues, cardinal and theological, to come down to minor particulars, he must, I say, be able to swim as well as Nicholas or Nicolao the Fish could, as the story goes; he must know how to shoe a horse, and repair his saddle and bridle; and, to return to higher matters, he must be faithful to God and to his lady; he must be pure in thought, decorous in words, generous in works, valiant in deeds, patient in suffering, compassionate towards the needy, and, lastly, an upholder of the truth though its defence should cost him his life. Of all these qualities, great and small, is a true knight-errant made up;

Robert E. Lee is America's great tragic hero, in the classical use of the term, doomed by a fatal flaw in one of his cardinal virtues, loyalty. He was a marvelously gifted soldier and an ardently devoted patriot, yet he defended the most unacceptable of American causes, secession and slavery, and he suffered the most un-American of experiences, defeat.

There are actually six cardinal virtues: Wisdom, Justice, Fortitude, Temperance, Altruism, Self-sacrifice.

The war on Christianity was also made manifest in the efforts to introduce neopaganism into the lives of the people. Joseph Ratzinger recalled that a young teacher in the village erected a maypole as a symbol of the pagan concept of the “life force.” He organized festivals for the summer solstice in homage to the sacredness of nature and dismissed traditional notions of sin, virtue, and redemption as alien ideas imposed by the cultural imperialism of the Jewish and Roman religion of Christianity. The old religious ideas had to make way for the new order, and the new order demanded a new age. Sixty years later, in his memoirs, Cardinal Ratzinger compared the anti-Christian neopaganism of the Nazis with the anti-Christian neopaganism of our own day: “When nowadays I hear how in many parts of the world Christianity is criticized as a destruction of individual cultural identity and an imposition of European values, I am amazed at how similar the types of argumentation are and at how familiar many a turn of phrase sounds.

The four principal ways of being excellent at being human are traditionally called the “cardinal” virtues: wisdom (sophia), self-restraint (sōphrosunē), courage (andreia), and justice (dikē).

North, south, east, west—the four virtues are a kind of compass (there’s a reason that the four points on a compass are called the “cardinal directions”). They guide us. They show us where we are and what is true.

In other words, the love with which we must first love God, and then our neighbour, is the love with which God loves, and that is God.

[...]Micah 6:8--to do justice, love mercy and to walk humbly with God. I would suggest that there is no solution to our national crisis absent those three cardinal virtues.

How easily and plausibly might He have taken up the position of one who did well to be angry! "I am the Christ, the Son of God," He might have said, "and have substantiated my claims by a thousand miracles in word and deed, yet they willfully refuse to recognize me; I am a poor homeless wanderer, yet they, knowing this, demanded the tribute, as if more for the sake of annoying and insulting me than of getting the money. And for what purpose do they collect these dues? For the support of a religious establishment thoroughly effete, to repair an edifice doomed to destruction, to maintain a priesthood scandalously deficient in the cardinal virtues of integrity and truth, and whose very existence is a curse to the land. I cannot in conscience pay a didrachmon, no, not even so much as a farthing, for any such objects.

The virtues are interrelated and inseparable, yet each is distinct from the others. Doing the right thing almost always takes courage, just as discipline is impossible without the wisdom to know what is worth choosing. What good is courage if not applied to justice? What good is wisdom if it doesn’t make us more modest? North, south, east, west—the four virtues are a kind of compass (there’s a reason that the four points on a compass are called the “cardinal directions”). They guide us. They show us where we are and what is true.

In the first book of this series on the cardinal virtues, courage was defined as the willingness to put your ass on the line—for something, for someone, for what you know you need to do. Self-discipline—the virtue of temperance—is even more important, the ability to keep your ass in line.

From the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we can identify three key ways to grow in virtue: (1) educating ourselves in the virtues, (2) putting in much effort, and (3) relying on God’s grace (see 1810-11).

For the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. For magic and applied science alike the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men:

Temperance is one of the four classical cardinal virtues. You have many easy events to do it daily; consider every time you sit and eat a chance to practice.

Franklin set up a pair of franchise versions of his print shop in other locations: the first in South Carolina, and the second in New York City. These complicated arrangements required Franklin to install a printer to run each operation locally, while he provided capital and expertise in exchange for splitting the profits. During this period, Franklin began to keep a daily checklist of cardinal virtues he desired to observe. Not surprisingly, one of these virtues was “industry,” which Franklin defined in his autobiography by the resolutions to “lose no time” and to “be always employed in something useful.” One can assume that this particular row on his list consistently received his check marks. This view of Franklin as the patron saint of busyness, however, misses a more nuanced story. While it’s true that his professional career began in a state of overload, it didn’t stay that way. Biographer H. W. Brands points out that as Franklin ground his way through his thirties, he began to burn out.

When I look back upon my own Christian experience, or at the church of Christ as a whole, I am amazed at how little humility is seen as the distinguishing feature of discipleship. In our preaching and in our living, in our daily interaction in our families and in our social life, as well as fellowship with other Christians, how easy it is to see that humility is not esteemed the cardinal virtue, the root from which grace can grow and the one indispensable condition of true fellowship with Jesus. The fact that it is possible for anyone to say of those who claim to seek holiness that the profession has not been accompanied with increasing humility, is a loud call to all earnest Christians, whatever truth there be in the charge, to prove that meekness and lowliness of heart are the chief marks by which they who follow the Lamb of God are to be known.

So if we want to influence people, we have to be realistic. Our reach should not exceed our grasp. For centuries, the church used to teach that there were four “cardinal virtues” that were central to living a good human life, and one of them was prudence.6 Prudence might be summarized as the moral virtue of being realistic. Today we tend to think of prudence or realism more as a manifestation of intelligence or savvy. But there were good reasons the church historically classified this as a moral virtue, an integral part of being a good person. Realism is essential to responsible behavior. It means you care whether your actions are actually improving the world and blessing others rather than destroying and burdening. Naiveté is not quaint, innocent, and morally purifying. It’s horribly destructive. Maybe some people can’t help being naive in some respects, but for the most part, naiveté is a serious sin. It’s lazy and irresponsible.

Ah! The Witches are a pragmatic race,” said Mickey in a tone of grandiose modesty. “Toleration is our cardinal virtue, second only to our scientific rationality.” Menelaus raised an eyebrow. “You guys call yourselves scientific?” “Of course,” said Mickey. “Enemies of science are cursed by the Crones.” “The ones who paint fright masks on biplane wings to create lift? Those Crones?” “Don’t be silly,” said Mickey. “Lift is created by the Bernoulli principle: wing curvature magically creates a partial vacuum which the goddess Nature abhors, and so she lifts the windcraft upward to occlude the void in compensation. The Witch-marks are inscribed not to create lift, but to avert malediction according to the law of sympathy and contagion. It is based on entirely different principle of the occult sciences.” “And you believe this because you’ll be cursed if you don’t?” Mickey looked at him with a level-eyed judicious look. “You have told me that you and your enemies can make it fated for nations, tribes, and peoples to rise and fall, meet victory or defeat, expansion or extinction, by means of mathematical hieroglyphs and incantations you found written on a dead moon circling an impossible star in the constellation of the Centaur? And you ask me to doubt something as obvious and elementary as a curse? Everyone utters curses. You utter curses.” “God damn it, I do not!” “You are a scoffer, then! Odd for a magical being not to believe in magic. Odd and dangerous! It is bad luck not to believe in curses! Beware!

When I look back upon my own religious experience,” says Andrew Murray, “or round upon the Church of Christ in the world, I stand amazed at the thought of how little humility is sought after as the distinguishing feature of the discipleship of Jesus. In preaching and living, in the daily intercourse of the home and social life, in the more special fellowship with Christians, in the direction and performance of work for Christ—alas! how much proof there is that humility is not esteemed the cardinal virtue, the only root from which the graces can grow, the one indispensable condition of true fellowship with Jesus.

Therefore the Buddha for a temporary purpose made these (uninitiated) observe the Five Precepts similar to the Five Virtues[FN#327] of the outside doctrine, in order to enable them to escape the three (worst) States[FN#328] of Existence, and to be reborn among men. (He also taught that) those who cultivate[FN#329] the tenfold virtue[FN#330] of the highest grade, and who give alms, and keep the precepts, and so forth, are to be born in the Six Celestial Realms of Kama[FN#331] while those who practise the Four[FN#332] Dhyanas, the Eight Samadhis,[FN#333] are to be reborn in the heavenly worlds of Rupa[FN#334] and Arupa. For this reason this doctrine is called the doctrine for men and Devas. According to this doctrine Karma is the origin of life.[FN#335] [FN#327] The five cardinal virtues of Confucianism are quite similar to the five precepts of Buddhism, as we see by this table: VIRTUES.—-PRECEPTS. 1. Humanity.—-1. Not to take life. 2. Uprightness.—-2. Not to steal. 3. Propriety.—-3. Not to be adulterous. 4. Wisdom.—-4. Not to get drunk. 5. Sincerity.—-5. Not to

There is nothing that requires more precision, and purity of expression, than to write in a familiar style,' as the great English essayist William Hazlitt put it nearly two hundred years ago. 'To write as anyone would speak in common conversation who had a thorough command and choice of words, or who could discourse with ease, force, and perspicuity...' To me these are the cardinal virtues of strong, convincing English prose.

philosophy asserts that virtue (meaning, chiefly, the four cardinal virtues of self-control, courage, justice, and wisdom) is happiness, and it is our perceptions of things—rather than the things themselves—that cause most of our trouble. Stoicism teaches that we can’t control or rely on anything outside what Epictetus called our “reasoned choice”—our ability to use our reason to choose how we categorize, respond, and reorient ourselves to external events.

Who upholds that the good is oft interred with our bones. ’Tisn’t true though it is Shakspeare who says it; if you leave your family or your pet hospital a good many thousands, you will get the cardinal virtues, and a trifle more, in letters of gold on your tomb; though if you have lived up to your income, or forgotten to insure, any penny-alining La Monnoye will do to scribble your epitaph, and break off with “C’est trop mentir pour cinq écus!

Curiosity is a worthwhile virtue than certainty. While the former leads to grow, the latter muzzles your growth and results in stagnation...

Someone once asked the Spartan king Leonidas to identify the supreme warrior virtue from which all others flowed. He replied: "Contempt for death." For us as artists, read "failure." Contempt for failure is our cardinal virtue.