809 Responsibility Quotes

Follow the three Rs: Respect for self, Respect for others and Responsibility for all your actions.

I believe it is an established maxim in morals that he who makes an assertion without knowing whether it is true or false, is guilty of falsehood; and the accidental truth of the assertion, does not justify or excuse him.

A fate is not a punishment.

The ethic of Reverence for Life prompts us to keep each other alert to what troubles us and to speak and act dauntlessly together in discharging the responsibility that we feel. It keeps us watching together for opportunities to bring some sort of help to animals in recompense for the great misery that men inflict upon them, and thus for a moment we escape from the incomprehensible horror of existence.

To the man who is truly ethical all life is sacred, including that which from the human point of view seems lower in the scale. He makes distinctions only as each case comes before him, and under the pressure of necessity, as, for example, when it falls to him to decide which of two lives he must sacrifice in order to preserve the other. But all through this series of decisions he is conscious of acting on subjective grounds and arbitrarily, and knows that he bears the responsibility for the life which is sacrificed.

We cannot abdicate our conscience to an organization, nor to a government. 'Am I my brother's keeper?' Most certainly I am! I cannot escape my responsibility by saying the State will do all that is necessary. It is a tragedy that nowadays so many think and feel otherwise.

Man must cease attributing his problems to his environment, and learn again to exercise his will - his personal responsibility in the realm of faith and morals.

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.

A man, as a general rule, owes very little to what he is born with - a man is what he makes of himself.

When Bush says that Abu Ghraib was the work of a few, he forgot to mention that he was one of them.

Dying is the most embarrassing thing that can ever happen to you, because someone's got to take care of all your details.

I would suggest respectfully to the president that he is not the sole decider. The decider is a shared and joint responsibility.

I am bewildered by the death of love. And my responsibility for it.

It's good to know that if I behave strangely enough, society will take full responsibility for me.

Before my eyes are many miserable scenes, the suffering of others and myself forces my hands to move. I become a machine for writing.

The headlong stream is termed violent But the river bed hemming it in is Termed violent by no one.

Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.

I cannot shift the blame for Chechnya, for the sorrow of numerous mothers and fathers. I made the decision, therefore I am responsible.

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

The reality is that the media are probably the most powerful of all our institutions today and they, or rather we [journalists], too often are squandering our power and ignoring our obligations. The consequence of our abdication of responsibility is the ugly spectacle of idiot culture!

All political power is a trust.

I have killed no one and I have ordered no one to be killed.

Did we not aid the grisly Taliban to achieve and hold power? Yes indeed 'we' did. Well, does that not double or triple our responsibility to remove them from power?

The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.

If you're going to condemn a people based on the actions of the worst of its ranks; take a good look at the worst of your people first and judge yourself.

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.

People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.

Sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul.

No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices.

One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In stopping to think through the meaning of what I have learned, there is much that I believe intensely, much I am unsure of. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.

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.

There is a powerful craving in most of us to see ourselves as instruments in the hands of others and thus free ourselves from the responsibility for acts which are prompted by our own questionable inclinations and impulses.

It's nice to have seen you, and I've got nobody to blame but myself.

If you fall out of that window and break both your legs, don't come running to me.

I would rather the man who presents something for my consideration subject me to a zephyr of truth and a gentle breeze of responsibility rather than blow me down with a curtain of hot wind.

I want you to take good care of all the furniture and ornaments of the house, for I want to find everything just as it is now when we come back again... We are coming back just four years from today.

Government seems to operate on the principle that if even one individual is incapable of using his freedom competently, no one can be allowed to be free.

The police can't stop an intruder, mugger, or stalker from hurting you. They can pursue him only after he has hurt or killed you. Protecting yourself from harm is your responsibility, and you are far less likely to be hurt in a neighborhood of gun-owners than in one of disarmed citizens - even if you don't own a gun yourself.

He's walking around with a $40 million plus film on his shoulders like he's been doing it all his life.

Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself.

To whom nothing is given, of him can nothing be required.

I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.

Why should we flagellate ourselves for what the Cambodians did to each other?

Doing nothing for others is the undoing of ourselves.

It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy.

Well, if I called the wrong number, why did you answer the phone?

Man has gone long enough, or even too long, without being man enough to face the simple truth that the trouble with Man is Man.

Nur der verdient sich Freiheit wie das Leben der taglich sie erobern muss.

I do nothing upon myself, and yet am mine own executioner.

Ignorance of the law excuses no man; not that all men know the law, but because 'tis an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to refute him.

It's too easy to blame other people and things in your past for your own self-loathing. (2004)

We are free, but not to be evil, not to be indifferent to human suffering, not to profit from the people, from the work created and sustained through their spirit of political association, while refusing to contribute to the political state that we profit from. We must say no once more. Man is not free to watch impassively the enslavement and dishonor of men, nor their struggles for liberty and honor.

A child, from the time he can think, should think about all he sees, should suffer for all who cannot live with honesty, should work so that all men can be honest, and should be honest himself. A child who does not think about what happens around him and is content with living without wondering whether he lives honestly is like a man who lives from a scoundrel's work and is on the road to being a scoundrel.

There is happiness in duty, although it may not seem so. To fulfill one's duty elevates the soul to a state of constant sweetness. Love is the bond between men, the way to teach and the center of the world.

To echo the first Filipino, you get the Rizal you deserve. (alluding to Rizal's statement, 'You get the government you deserve')

'We welcome constructive criticism and will abide by our commitment to address the concern of the community at large on the issue.'

This earth is one of the rare spots in the cosmos where mind has flowered. Man is a product of nearly three billion years of evolution, in whose person the evolutionary process has at last become conscious of itself and its possibilities. Whether he likes it or not, he is responsible for the whole further evolution of our planet.

Man emerged as the dominant type on earth about a million years ago, but has only been really effective as a psychosocial organism for under ten thousand years. In that mere second of cosmic time, he has produced astonishing achievements - but has also been guilty of unprecedented horrors and follies. And looked at in the long perspective of evolution he is singularly imperfect, still incapable of carrying out his planetary responsibilities in a satisfactory manner...

I accept responsibility for U-boat warfare from 1933 onward, and of the entire navy from 1943 on, but to make me responsible for what happened to Jews in Germany, or Russian soldiers on the east front - it is so ridiculous all I can do is laugh.

We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers - but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault, because if you wanted to change you're the one who has got to change.

I'm opposed to censorship of any kind, especially by government. But it's plain common sense that producers should target their product with some kind of sensitivity.

It is written that 'All Jews are responsible for one another,' and a Jew who lives in Siberia or in Kamchatka is just as good as a Jew who had the good fortune to be born in Jerusalem.

But I think we have to be very vigilant. We have to stop the rot wherever we find it. Some fifty years ago, a few people created horror, but far too many, knowing about it, tolerated it. It started then just as now - with graffiti, vulgar jokes, and knowing winks. Then it was the Jews, now it is the Turks and the Vietnamese. The moment one hears somebody say something offensive to human dignity in any way, whether against foreigners or people of other faiths or colour, one must protest and argue. These individual attitudes must never go unchallenged. The obscenity of discrimination will only be stopped if we accept individual responsibility for never, in a single instance, allowing it to go unchallenged. That, I think, is our task - yes, as our parents' children.

Calling someone a monster does not make him more guilty; it makes him less so by classing him with beasts and devils.

'When have you ever heard the United States take the blame for anything? This is no different.'

There is little less trouble in governing a private family than a whole kingdom.

From the heights of these pyramids, forty centuries look down on us.

Big pay and little responsibility are circumstances seldom found together.

Our daily deeds as ordinary South Africans must produce an actual South African reality that will reinforce humanity's belief in justice, strengthen its confidence in the nobility of the human soul and sustain all our hopes for a glorious life for all. All this we owe both to ourselves and to the peoples of the world who are so well represented here today.

I have walked that long road to freedom. I have tried not to falter; I have made missteps along the way. But I have discovered the secret that after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can rest only for a moment, for with freedom comes responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not yet ended.

It never occurred that the highest leader of the military armed forces would leave 50,000 people to face the horror that they faced all by themselves when they needed him most.

I am the one in charge of the 19 brothers : I was responsible for entrusting the 19 brothers : with the raids.

Really, if the lower orders don't set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them?

To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.

The home seems to me to be the proper sphere for the man. And certainly once a man begins to neglect his domestic duties he becomes painfully effeminate, does he not?

Sooner or later we have all to pay for what we do.

Nature has come to a point where now, unless you take individual responsibility, you cannot grow. More than this nature cannot do. It has done enough. It has given you life, it has given you opportunity; now how to use it, it has left up to you. Meditation is your freedom, not a biological necessity. You can learn in a certain period of time every day to strengthen meditation, to make it stronger - but carry the flavor of it the whole day.

I accept responsibility for the camps, but as far as measures against the Jews, I had nothing to do with them. Those orders came from the RSHA. Himmler sent orders to Kaltenbrunner, who transmitted them to Mueller of the Gestapo, and the latter had the entire extermination program under him. That was the way all of Himmler's orders went. I did not participate in the murder of the Jews.

Himmler chose certain camps and, together with Kaltenbrunner and Mueller, ordered the commandants of these camps to carry out the extermination program. This was done in the chain of command as I have just told you. I emphasize that it was Himmler to Kaltenbrunner to Mueller to Gluecks, who was also one of my subordinate generals, to the individual concentration camp commandants, who had been selected by Himmler to perform the exterminations. Otherwise, Himmler would have had to give the orders to me because I was technically in charge of the concentration camps. What I am trying to bring out is that although I am responsible for the camps, and the extermination program took place within these camps, I am not responsible for the extermination program itself, because these orders did not go through me, but went through the chain of individuals I have just mentioned.

I had eleven main concentration camps under my command. From these eleven camps, internees were sent to other so-called labor camps. That was my job. I had nothing to do with the final solution of the Jews. That was an act done by camp personnel such as the commandants. Of course, the center of all those orders for the extermination of the Jews was Mueller of the Gestapo, who received his orders from Kaltenbrunner, who carried out the plans of Himmler.

I can only be responsible for my orders. I cannot be responsible for all the acts of Himmler.

I have no regrets except that I wasn't up to keep Randy (Rhoads) from getting on that plane.

I don't consider myself a great singer--but I have a connection with the audience. There's the artist, and then a void and the audience; but I like to be part of the audience. I'd like to be them, and I'd like them to be me for an hour and a half. I get criticized for being the antichrist, causing kids to commit suicide, but that's total bullsh-t. My intentions are not that. Every year they have Halloween, and all I do is take Halloween night out on the road every night. It's like a Halloween party every night. If that was the case on Halloween night, the police cells would be full--everyone would have turned Satanic for the night!

Get a job. Do some work like the rest of us.

I am not like the Leader of the Opposition. I did not slither out of the Cabinet room like a mangy maggot.

As free citizens in a political democracy, we have a responsibility to be interested and involved in the affairs of the human community, be it at the local or the global level.

The only way to change is to vote. People are responsible.

When good people in any country cease their vigilance and struggle, then evil men prevail.

I don't think the public realizes how much soul-searching goes on in news organizations about what is the right thing to do.

It is our responsibilities, not ourselves, that we should take seriously.

He who helps the guilty, shares the crime.

:[T]o whom can I be responsible, and why should I be, when you refuse to see me? And wait until I reveal how truly irresponsible I am. Responsibility rests upon recognition, and recognition is a form of agreement.