Selected duty quotes

1. When faith and hope fail, as they do sometimes, we must try charity, which is love in action. We must speculate no more on our duty, but simply do it. When we have done it, however blindly, perhaps Heaven will show us why.

2. Mine to the core of the heart, my beauty! Mine, all mine, and for love, not duty: Love given willingly, full and free, Love for love's sake - as mine to thee. Duty's a slave that keeps the keys, But Love, the master, goes in and out Of his goodly chambers with song and shout, Just as he please - just as he please.

3. The Jews are the living embodiment of the minority, the constant reminder of what duties societies owe their minorities, whoever they might be.

4. You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

5. May therefore God give us the strength to continue to do our duty and with this prayer we bow in homage before our dead heroes, before those whom they have left behind in bereavement, and before all the other victims of this war.

6. Public service is my motto.

7. The right response when, in the army, you are given an unlawful order, is to refuse that order. The right response of a chief executive in this state and in this nation, when faced with an order by a court that he conscientiously believes violates the constitution he is sworn to respect, is to refuse their order!

8. A soldier's first duty is to obey, otherwise you might as well do away with soldiering.

9. A military leader often faces a situation he has to deal with, but because it is his duty, no court can try him.

10. Whoever is spared personal pain must feel himself called to help in diminishing the pain of others. We must all carry our share of the misery which lies upon the world.

11. Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but as sacred. He is willing to risk his life in its defense and its conscious that he gains protection while he gives it.

12. Aeneas carried his aged father on his back from the ruins of Troy and so do we all, whether we like it or not, perhaps even if we have never known them.

13. Piety requires us to honor truth above our friends.

14. The fundamental purpose of government is to protect its citizens.

15. Thought may well be ever ranging, And opinion ever changing, Task-work be, though ill begun, Dealt with by experience better; By the law and by the letter Duty done is duty done Do it, Time is on the wing!

16. There is a great Field-Marshal, my friend, who arrays our battalions; Let us to Providence trust, and abide and work in our stations.

17. When we send our young men and women into harm's way, we have a solemn obligation not to fudge the numbers or shade the truth about why they're going, to care for their families while they're gone, to tend to the soldiers upon their return, and to never ever go to war without enough troops to win the war, secure the peace, and earn the respect of the world.

18. So long as there is death there will be sorrow, and so long as there is sorrow it can be no part of the duty of human beings to increase its amount, in spite of the fact that a few rare spirits know how to transmute it.

19. A sense of duty is useful in work but offensive in personal relations. People wish to be liked, not to be endured with patient resignation.

20. If you want to do your duty properly, you should do just a little more than that.

21. I have never had any [enemies] other than those of the state.

22. The office of the Vice-President is a greater honor than I ever dreamed of attaining.

23. Whether you actually can or can't fight city hall is of little relevance. Either way, when the need arises, you must!

24. Neither the few nor the many have a right to act merely by their will, in any matter connected with duty, trust, engagement, or obligation.

25. An event has happened, upon which it is difficult to speak, and impossible to be silent.

26. In their nomination to office they will not appoint to the exercise of authority as to a pitiful job, but as to a holy function.

27. Modern man is weighed down more by the burden of responsibility than by the burden of sin. We think him more a savior who shoulders our responsibilities than him who shoulders our sins. If instead of making decisions we have but to obey and do our duty, we feel it as a sort of salvation.

28. I do not feel guilty of any war crimes, I have only done my duty as an intelligence organ, and I refuse to serve as an ersatz for Himmler.

29. This is, I say, the time for all good men not to go to the aid of their party, but to come to the aid of their country.

30. Saints are simply men and women who have fulfilled their natural obligation which is to approach God.

31. I am conscious of having served England as I served my own country.

32. Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

33. This foreign policy stuff is a little frustrating.

34. The General hopes and trusts that every officer and man will endeavor to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier defending the dearest rights and liberties of his country.

35. While we are zealously performing the duties of good citizens and soldiers, we certainly ought not to be inattentive to the higher duties of religion. To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian.

36. Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of Action; and bidding an Affectionate farewell to this August body under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life.

37. In executing the duties of my present important station, I can promise nothing but purity of intentions, and, in carrying these into effect, fidelity and diligence.

38. I had rather be in my grave than in my present situation, I had rather be on my farm than be emperor of the world; and yet they charge me with wanting to be a king.

39. Happiness and moral duty are inseparably connected.

40. Let your heart feel for the afflictions and distress of everyone, and let your hand give in proportion to your purse.

41. Hi, I'm a hero, but I can't tell you why. It's classified.

42. I take it as a man's duty to restrain himself.

43. Help one another is part of the religion of our sisterhood.

44. Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden.

45. To grasp the full significance of life is the actor's duty, to interpret it is his problem, and to express it his dedication.

46. I tread in the footsteps of illustrious men... in receiving from the people the sacred trust confided to my illustrious predecessor.

47. The honorary duty of a human being is to love.

48. Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.

49. The State, in choosing men to serve it, takes no notice of their opinions. If they be willing faithfully to serve it, that satisfies.

50. That which brought me into the capacity I now stand in, was the Petition and Advice given me by you, who, in reference to the ancient Constitution, did draw me here to accept the place of Protector. There is not a man living can say I sought it, no not a man, nor woman, treading upon English ground.

51. It is not my design to drink or to sleep, but my design is to make what haste I can to be gone.

52. On becoming soldiers we have not ceased to be citizens.

53. We have to go. I'm almost happy here.

54. My job is to investigate whether or not a crime is committed, can be proved and should be charged. I'm not going to comment on what to make beyond that. You know, it's not my jurisdiction, not my job, not my judgment.

55. If we wish to be free; if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending; if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained - we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms, and to the God of hosts, is all that is left us.

56. Let's just say that I think any person who aspires, presumes, or feels the calling to be an artist has a built-in sense of duty.

57. I don't think there's anything exceptional or noble in being philanthropic. It's the other attitude that confuses me.

58. Animals are not our playthings. We are on this earth to protect them. It's our duty.

59. I run because I am convinced that this country is on a perilous course and I have such strong feelings about what must be done.

60. The President of the United States of necessity owes his election to office to the suffrage and zealous labors of a political party, the members of which cherish with ardor and regard as of essential importance the principles of their party organization; but he should strive to be always mindful of the fact that he serves his party best who serves the country best.

61. Moral obligation is to me so very strong a Stimulant, that in 9 cases out of ten it acts as a Narcotic. The Blow that should rouse, stuns me.

62. Has a philosopher like you failed to discover that our country is more to be valued and higher and holier far than mother or father or any ancestor, and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and of men of understanding?

63. Our duty is to encourage every one in his struggle to live up to his own highest idea, and strive at the same time to make the ideal as near as possible to the Truth.

64. Those who grumble at the little thing that has fallen to their lot to do will grumble at everything. Always grumbling, they will lead a miserable life, and everything will be a failure. But those who do their duties as they go, putting their shoulders to the wheel, will see the light, and higher duties will fall to their share.

65. Obedience of the law is demanded; not asked as a favor.

66. The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.

67. We need the iron qualities that go with true manhood. We need the positive virtues of resolution, of courage, of indomitable will, of power to do without shrinking the rough work that must always be done.

68. When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer 'Present' or 'Not guilty.'

69. I agree with you that it is the duty of every good citizen to use all the opportunities, which occur to him, for preserving documents relating to the history of our country.

70. He who leads troops has no right to think about himself.

71. I do feel ashamed of having participated to the slightest even as a tool in those dark days. But I was obliged to serve the state to which I had taken an oath. It was a tragic fate.

72. The sorrow for the dead is the only sorrow from which we refuse to be divorced. Every other wound we seek to heal - every other affliction to forget: but this wound we consider it a duty to keep open - this affliction we cherish and brood over in solitude.

73. I call on God Almighty to have mercy on the German people. More than two million German soldiers went to their death for the fatherland before me. I follow now my sons - all for Germany.

74. It is tragic to have to realize that the best I had to give as a soldier, obedience, and loyalty, was exploited for purposes which could not be recognized at the time, and that I did not see that there is a limit set even for a soldier's performance to his duty. That is my fate.

75. What we really need the poet's and orator's I help to keep alive in us is not, then, the common and gregarious courage which Robert Shaw showed when he marched with you, men of the Seventh Regiment. It is that more lonely courage which he showed when he dropped his warm commission in the glorious Second to head your dubious fortunes, negroes of the Fifty-fourth. That lonely kind of courage (civic courage as we call it in times of peace) is the kind of valor to which the monuments of nations should most of all be reared.

76. The public must and will be served.

77. The price of greatness is responsibility.

78. The troubles of our proud and angry dust Are from eternity, and shall not fail. Bear them we can, and if we can we must. Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.

79. Freedom does not mean doing what you can get away with, doing what you please. It means, instead, having the opportunity to do what you ought to do--for family and for community and for humanity as a whole.

80. It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs.

81. The brave man inattentive to his duty, is worth little more to his country, than the coward who deserts her in the hour of danger.

82. Search for the truth is the noblest occupation of man; its publication is a duty.

83. I am not only not prepared to bring forward any measure of this nature, but I will at once declare that, as far as I am concerned, as long as I hold any station in the Government of the country, I shall always feel it my duty to resist such measures when proposed by others.

84. He who serves our Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, serves Germany, and he who serves Germany, serves God.

85. 'I scorn your idea of love,' I could not help saying, as I rose up and stood before him, leaning my back against the rock. 'I scorn the counterfeit sentiment you offer; yes, St. John, and I scorn you when you offer it.'

86. Your sense of responsibility to others can never be excessive.

87. A sacred burden is this life ye bear: Look on it, lift it, bear it solemnly, Stand up and walk beneath it steadfastly. Fail not for sorrow, falter not for sin, But onward, upward, till the goal ye win.

88. Marital intercourse is certainly holy, lawful and praiseworthy in itself and profitable to society, yet in certain circumstances it can prove dangerous, as when through excess the soul is made sick with venial sin, or through the violation and perversion of its primary end, killed by mortal sin; such perversion, detestable in proportion to its departure from the true order, being always mortal sin, for it is never lawful to exclude the primary end of marriage which is the procreation of children.

89. The Sixth Army, true to their oath and conscious of the lofty importance of their mission, have held their position to the last man and the last round for Fuhrer and Fatherland unto the end.

90. Written over the gate here are the words 'Leave every hope behind, ye who enter.' Only think what a relief that is! For what is hope? A form of moral responsibility. Here there is no hope, and consequently no duty, no work, nothing to be gained by praying, nothing to be lost by doing what you like. Hell, in short, is a place where you have nothing to do but amuse yourself.

91. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.

92. For myself the delay may be compared with a reprieve; for in confidence I assure you, with the world it would obtain little credit that my movements to the chair of Government will be accompanied by feelings not unlike those of a culprit who is going to the place of his execution: so unwilling am I, in the evening of a life nearly consumed in public cares, to quit a peaceful abode for an Ocean of difficulties, without that competency of political skill, abilities and inclination which is necessary to manage the helm.

93. 'My country, right or wrong' is a thing that no patriot would think of saying, except in a desperate case. It is like saying, 'My mother, drunk or sober'.

94. Thank God, I have done my duty.

95. I kiss the soil as if I placed a kiss on the hands of a mother, for the homeland is our earthly mother. I consider it my duty to be with my compatriots in this sublime and difficult moment.

96. Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me.

97. I know who and what I am. I am The Executioner, and I don't date Vampires. I kill them.

98. Any community's arm of force - military, police, security - needs people in it who can do necessary evil, and yet not be made evil by it. To do only the necessary and no more. To constantly question the assumptions, to stop the slide into atrocity.

99. The citizen who thinks he sees that the commonwealth's political clothes are worn out, and yet holds his peace and does not agitate for a new suit, is disloyal, he is a traitor. That he may be the only one who thinks he sees this decay, does not excuse him: it is his duty to agitate anyway, and it is the duty of others to vote him down if they do not see the matter as he does.

100. Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind, That from the nunnery Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind, To war and arms I fly.