To the Young People's Society, Greenpoint Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn (February 16, 1901).
Variant: Always do right. This will gratify some people, and astonish the rest.
“Always do what's right; this will gratify some and astonish the rest”
No. 4, What Is It
1790s, Poems from Blake's Notebook (c. 1791-1792), Several Questions Answered
“You're doing the best you can, right? Isn't that what we always tell each other?”
Gabby Parker, Chapter 19, p. 227
2000s, The Choice (2007)
“The time is always right to do what’s right.”
Speech delivered in Finney Chapel at Oberlin College (22 October 1964), as reported in "When MLK came to Oberlin" by Cindy Leise, The Chronicle-Telegram (21 January 2008) http://chronicle.northcoastnow.com/2008/01/21/when-mlk-came-to-oberlin/
1960s
Variant: The time is always right to do what’s right.
Lt. Cmdr. Charles E. Madison.
The Americanization of Emily (1964)
Context: You've done the morally right thing. God save us all from people who do the morally right thing. It's always the rest of us who get broken in half.
Source: The Revolt of the Masses (1929), Chapter XV: We Arrive At The Real Question
The Inferno (1917), Ch. XVI
Context: I come back as I always do to the greatness of mankind's curse, and I repeat it with the monotony of those who are always right — oh, without God, without a harbour, without enough rags to cover us, all we have, standing erect on the land of the dead, is the rebellion of our smile, the rebellion of being gay when darkness envelops us. We are divinely alone, the heavens have fallen on our heads.
