“One thing I'm very glad to see. Your General Lee is a moralist, as are all true gentlemen, of course, but he respects minor vice, harmless vice, when he finds it in others. Now that's the mark of a true gentlemen. That is what distinguishes the man so to me, aside from his military prowess, of course. The true gentlemen has no vices, but he allows you your own.”

— Michael Shaara, book The Killer Angels

Lt. Col Arthur Freemantle, Part II, CH 5: Longstreet, p. 130
The Killer Angels (1974)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "One thing I'm very glad to see. Your General Lee is a moralist, as are all true gentlemen, of course, but he respects m…" by Michael Shaara?

Michael Shaara20

American writer 1928–1988

Related quotes

“Constitutionally, gentlemen, you have the president, the vice president and the secretary of state, in that order, and should the president decide he wants to transfer the helm to the vice president, he will do so. As for now, I'm in control here, in the White House, pending the return of the vice president and in close touch with him. If something came up, I would check with him, of course.”

Alexander Haig (1924–2010) former U.S. States Secretary of State and U.S. Army general

March 30, 1981, after Ronald Reagan was hospitalized. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2001/04/23/60II/main287292.shtml.

“To try curing someone of a "vice," of what is the deepest thing he has, is to attack his very being, and this is indeed how he himself understands it, since he will never forgive you for wanting him to destroy himself in your way and not his.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

Drawn and Quartered (1983)

“The fallacy of that book is, that Mandeville defines neither vices nor benefits. He reckons among vices everything that gives pleasure. He takes the narrowest system of morality, monastick morality, which holds pleasure itself to be a vice, such as eating salt with our fish, because it makes it taste better; and he reckons wealth as a publick benefit, which is by no means always true. Pleasure of itself is not a vice.”

Bernard Mandeville (1670–1733) Anglo-Dutch writer and physician

Dr. Johnson in conversation, April 15, 1778, reported in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1791) p. 948.
Criticism

“That the American, by temperament, worked to excess, was true; work and whiskey were his stimulants; work was a form of vice; but he never cared much for money or power after he earned them. The amusement of the pursuit was all the amusement he got from it.”

Henry Adams (1838–1918) journalist, historian, academic, novelist

The Education of Henry Adams (1907)

“They have read your novel... and they said only one thing, that, unfortunately, it is not finished. So I wanted to show you your hero. He has been sitting here for about two thousand years, sleeping, but, when the moon is full, he is tormented, as you see, by insomnia. And it torments not only him, but his faithful guardian, the dog. If it is true that cowardice is the most grave vice, then the dog, at least, is not guilty of it. The only thing that brave creature ever feared was thunderstorms. But what can be done, the one who loves must share the fate of the one who is loved.”

Mikhail Bulgakov book The Master and Margarita

Book Two in 'Time to Go! Time to Go!', B/O, here Woland is speaking to the Master about Pontius Pilate
The Master and Margarita (1967)

“A devout and naïve Christian was admonishing those who questioned the articles of faith. “A true Christian must never examine the things he's told to believe, gentlemen,” he said. “It's like taking a pill: if you chew it, it's so bitter you'll never get it down.””

Nicolas Chamfort (1741–1794) French writer

Reflections

“Not to know vice at all, and keep true state,
Is virtue, and not fate:
Next to that virtue is to know vice well,
And her black spite expel.”

Ben Jonson (1572–1637) English writer

Epode, lines 1-4
The Works of Ben Jonson, First Folio (1616), The Forest

“A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others. When he has no respect for anyone, he can no longer love, and in him, he yields to his impulses, indulges in the lowest form of pleasure, and behaves in the end like an animal in satisfying his vices. And it all comes from lying — to others and to yourself.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821–1881) Russian author

Variant translations:
Above all, do not lie to yourself. A man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point where he does not discern any truth either in himself or anywhere around him, and thus falls into disrespect towards himself and others. Not respecting anyone, he ceases to love, and having no love, he gives himself up to passions and coarse pleasures, in order to occupy and amuse himself, and in his vices reaches complete bestiality, and it all comes from lying continually to others and to himself. A man who lies to himself is often the first to take offense. It sometimes feels very good to take offense, doesn't it? And surely he knows that no one has offended him, and that he himself has invented the offense and told lies just for the beauty of it, that he has exaggerated for the sake of effect, that he has picked on a word and made a mountain out of a pea — he knows all of that, and still he is the first to take offense, he likes feeling offended, it gives him great pleasure, and thus he reaches the point of real hostility… Do get up from your knees and sit down, I beg you, these posturings are false, too.
Part I, Book I: A Nice Little Family, Ch. 2 : The Old Buffoon; as translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, p. 44
The Brothers Karamazov (1879–1880)

“Love is not about conquest. The truth is a man can only find true love when he surrenders to it. When he opens his heart to the partner of his soul and says: "Here it is! The very essence of me! It is yours to nurture or destroy.”

David Gemmell (1948–2006) British author of heroic fantasy

Source: Lord of the Silver Bow

“A man must have vices, expensive ones if possible. Otherwise when he reaches old age he will have nothing to be redeemed from.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón book The Angel's Game

Source: The Angel's Game

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Michael Shaara20

Related quotes

Related topics