#justify

...Imagine that you yourself are building the edifice of human destiny with the object of making people happy in the finale, of giving them peace and rest at last, but for that you must inevitably and unavoidably torture just one tiny creature, that same child who was beating her chest with her little fist, and raise your edifice on the foundation of her unrequited tears--would you agree to be the architect on such conditions? ↗

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

#means-justifying-the-ends #profound #religion #sublime #imagination

I came from a family who believed in, in quotes, the Rights of Man, who believed that in order to justify the sort of luxurious life that the majority of us have, related to the whole world, that you had to do something. ↗

— Richard Attenborough

#came #family #had #i #i came

If the end does not justify the means - what can? ↗

— Edward Abbey

#end #justify #means

It will never do to plead sin as an excuse for sin, or to attempt to justify sinful acts by pleading that we have an evil heart. This instead of being a valid apology, is the very ground of our condemnation. ↗

— Archibald Alexander

#apology #attempt #being #condemnation #evil

The purpose of terrorism lies not just in the violent act itself. It is in producing terror. It sets out to inflame, to divide, to produce consequences which they then use to justify further terror. ↗

— Tony Blair

#consequences #divide #further #inflame #itself

We did a lot of that in drama school: intellectualising and maybe justifying your position. 'I am a thinking actor and I have thought this through' - well, just do it. I much prefer the doing aspect. ↗

— Michael Fassbender

#am #aspect #did #doing #drama

Only a philosophy of eternity, in the world today, could justify non-violence. ↗

— Albert Camus

#eternity #justify #non-violence #only #philosophy

A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide. ↗

— Oliver Wendell Holmes

#blow #both #cause #character #commonly

Islam expect every Muslim to do this duty, and if we realise our responsibility time will come soon when we shall justify ourselves worthy of a glorious past. ↗

— Muhammad Ali Jinnah

#duty #every #expect #glorious #islam

Abortion and racism are both symptoms of a fundamental human error. The error is thinking that when someone stands in the way of our wants, we can justify getting that person out of our lives. Abortion and racism stem from the same poisonous root, selfishness. ↗

— Alveda King

#both #error #fundamental #getting #human