“The sentiment sounded trite, but then didn’t most good sentiments sound trite? It was hard to make goodness – and good people – sound interesting. Yet the good were worthy of note, of course, because they battled and that battle was a great story, whereas the evil were evil because of moral laziness, or weakness, and that was ultimately a dull and uninteresting affair.”

— Alexander McCall Smith

Friends, Lovers, Chocolate, chapter 3.
The Sunday Philosophy Club series

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Alexander McCall Smith 55

British writer 1948

Charles de Lint (1951) author

Goninan in Part One: The Hidden People, "Border Spirit" p. 336
The Little Country (1991)

“If the story of my early years with Russ sound like they were years of battle, then the sound is correct.”

C. West Churchman (1913–2004) American philosopher and systems scientist

C. West Churchman (1990, p. 130) cited in: Magnus Ramage, Karen Shipp (2009) Systems Thinkers. p. 140
1980s and later

“Just because a poet said something didn’t mean it was true, only that it sounded good.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

“The principles which discriminate in politics between good and evil, and make states worthy to last, were not yet found.”

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton (1834–1902) British politician and historian

The History of Freedom in Christianity (1877)
Context: That men should understand that governments do not exist by divine right, and that arbitrary government is the violation of divine right, was no doubt the medicine suited to the malady under which Europe languished. But although the knowledge of this truth might become an element of salutary destruction, it could give little aid to progress and reform. Resistance to tyranny implied no faculty of constructing a legal government in its place. Tyburn tree may be a useful thing; but it is better still that the offender should live for repentance and reformation. The principles which discriminate in politics between good and evil, and make states worthy to last, were not yet found.

“In a free society, it is hard for “good” people to do “good,” but that is a small price to pay for making it hard for “evil” people to do “evil,” especially since one man's good is anther's evil.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

“A Friedman doctrine‐- The Social Responsibility Of Business Is to Increase Its Profits” (Sept. 1970)

“I think the old, sound, and honest maxim that "you shall not do evil that good may come," is applicable in law as well as in morals.”

Sir Alexander Cockburn, 12th Baronet (1802–1880) Lord Chief Justice

Reg. v. Hicklin and another (1868), 11 Cox, C. C. 27; S. C. 3 L. R. Q. B. 372; reported in Dictionary of Legal Quotations (1904) by James William Norton-Kyshe, p. 92.