Aphorisms Galore!

Vice and Virtue

161 aphorisms  ·  5 comments

Aphorisms in This Category

tiny.ag/mgrteolp  ·  submitted 2011 by peter

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

Robert J. Hanlon, in Altruism and Cynicism and Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/e2igybvl  ·  submitted 1999 by Erwin van Moll

In adultery, there is usually tenderness and self-sacrifice; in murder, courage; in profanation and blasphemy, a certain satanic splendour. Judas elected those offences unvisited by any virtues: abuse of confidence and informing.

Jorge Luis Borges, "Three Versions of Judas", in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/lhbjvuc3  ·  submitted 1997

He that leaveth nothing to Chance will do few things ill, but he will do few things.

Lord Halifax, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/yzqij6mr  ·  submitted 1997

I've never met a healthy person who worried much about his health or a good person who worried much about his soul.

Haldane, in Vice and Virtue and Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/qeydmvyx  ·  submitted 1997

Let everyone sweep in front of his own door, and the whole world will be clean.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/tymlwb79  ·  submitted 1997

For a man to achieve all that is demanded of him, he must regard himself as greater than he is.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, in Vice and Virtue and Work and Recreation

tiny.ag/mabd7tri  ·  submitted 1997

Live so that your friends can defend you but never have to.

Arnold H. Glasgow, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/9uv5rp2p  ·  submitted 1997

He whose face gives no light shall never become a star.

William Blake, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/9te2rxr1  ·  submitted 1997

A truth that's told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent

William Blake, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/zl0ikbnv  ·  submitted 1997

Coward: one who, in a perilous emergency, thinks with his legs.

Ambrose Bierce, in Vice and Virtue and War and Peace

tiny.ag/ca72ttqk  ·  submitted 1997

It has been observed that one's nose is never so happy as when it is thrust into the affairs of another, from which some physiologists have drawn the inference that the nose is devoid of the sense of smell.

Ambrose Bierce, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/x2tnoops  ·  submitted 1997

The Puritans hated bear-baiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators.

Thomas Macaulay, History of England, I, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/pu94ynqw  ·  submitted 1997

You're not drunk if you can lie on the floor without holding on.

Dean Martin, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/vdvrew4w  ·  submitted 1997

Pardo's First Postulate: Anything good in life is either illegal, immoral, or fattening.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/nsh95i8e  ·  submitted 1997

People who claim they don't let little things bother them have never slept in a room with a single mosquito.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/0arre1jp  ·  submitted 1997

People who have no faults are terrible; there is no way of taking advantage of them.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/jgcbbn8p  ·  submitted 1997

Revenge is sleeping with your enemy's wife. Sweet revenge is the realization that she's a lousy lay.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/kqsn5x9k  ·  submitted 1997

Resisting temptation is easier when you think you'll probably get another chance later on.

Unknown, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/9yutw8at  ·  submitted 1997

It does not take much strength to do things, but it takes great strength to know what to do.

Jess Lair, in Vice and Virtue

tiny.ag/pxnbu4ey  ·  submitted 1997

A woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke.

Rudyard Kipling, in Men and Women and Vice and Virtue