Rousseau http://www.gutenberg.org/files/14052/14052-h/14052-h.htm (1876)
“Sometimes doing your best is not good enough. Sometimes you must do what is required.”
The Liberals' Mistake (1987)
Context: The liberals were right when they insisted that we had enough food and goods for all of our people. But they did not — and we still do not — know how to distribute those goods in a rational way. We have failed to figure out how to turn this abundance into an advantage. The liberals were also right about labor-saving. If we evenly distributed the work that needs to be done, there ought to be a lot of time left over for everybody to have the leisure that people need. But we have managed to reverse that. Today, a great many people cannot find any work. People are dispossessed and cannot support themselves or their families. Many are homeless. For many others, work has become a rat race: something to be endured, not enjoyed.
Today we are witnessing an impoverishment: the apparent drying up of resources for all kinds of things that are badly needed. We seem to have no money for housing, for education, or for health and social services. And yet we have a deficit, and we are told by candidates for public office that we must cut the federal budget even more. This impoverishment is a mystery.
“You must do right before you feel good.”
Part 1.3 Rights of Man
1790s, Rights of Man, Part I (1791)
“It's not enough to do good. You have to be seen doing good.”
DA Arthur Branch in the Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode In the Wee Small Hours.
Law & Order: Criminal Intent
“We all do what we can, and it has to be good enough, and if it isn't good enough, it has to do.”
Source: The Dead Zone 1979
“Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”
“Knowing is not enough, we must apply. Willing is not enough, we must do.”
“When a man is old enough to do wrong he should be old enough to do right also.”
Source: A Woman of No Importance
