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“Justice is not fulfilled by good intentions alone; it demands institutional courage. When systems protect comfort over conscience, injustice becomes routine. A fair society is one where doing the right thing is structurally easier than doing the wrong one.”

Last update Sept. 26, 2026. History

Gregory David Roberts (1952) Australian writer and bank robber

“Ethical behavior is doing the right thing when no one else is watching — even when doing the wrong thing is legal.”

Aldo Leopold (1887–1948) American writer and scientist

Presumably a paraphrase of "A peculiar virtue in wildlife ethics is that the hunter ordinarily has no gallery to applaud or disapprove of his conduct" or of "Hunting for sport is an improvement ..." above.
Unlikely to be by Leopold, who knew that ethics involves not only doing the right thing, but also determining the right thing in the face of competing desirable criteria.
Misattributed

“It will always happen when a thing is originally wrong that amendments do not make it right, and it oftens happens that they do as much mischief one way as good the other…”

Thomas Paine book Rights of Man

Part 1.3 Rights of Man
1790s, Rights of Man, Part I (1791)

“There can be as many wrong reasons to do the right thing as there are stars in the sky. There might even be more than one legitimate right reason. But there is never a right reason to do the wrong thing. Not ever.”

Donita K. Paul (1950) American writer

Source: DragonKnight

“I do consider my engaged poetry as a personal mission, a duty towards a society which evolves into a system of control of consciences: one even becomes a suspect for not thinking correctly!”

Jan Theuninck (1954) painter, poet

Je considère la poésie engagée comme une mission personnelle, un devoir envers une société où on évolue vers un contrôle des consciences : on devient même suspect de ne pas penser correctement ! <br class="br">As quoted in Letteratour (29 November 2004) http://www.letteratour.it/interviste/H02theunJ01.htm

“It often requires more courage to dare to do right than to fear to do wrong.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

“That’s where courage comes from -- when we turn not from each other, or on each other, but towards one another, and we find that we do not walk alone. That’s where courage comes from.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

2013, "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony (August 2013)
Context: The March on Washington teaches us that we are not trapped by the mistakes of history; that we are masters of our fate. But it also teaches us that the promise of this nation will only be kept when we work together. We’ll have to reignite the embers of empathy and fellow feeling, the coalition of conscience that found expression in this place 50 years ago. And I believe that spirit is there, that truth force inside each of us. I see it when a white mother recognizes her own daughter in the face of a poor black child. I see it when the black youth thinks of his own grandfather in the dignified steps of an elderly white man. It’s there when the native-born recognizing that striving spirit of the new immigrant; when the interracial couple connects the pain of a gay couple who are discriminated against and understands it as their own. That’s where courage comes from -- when we turn not from each other, or on each other, but towards one another, and we find that we do not walk alone. That’s where courage comes from.

“So much easier is it to do many things than to do one thing for a long time continuously.”
Adeo facilius est multa facere quam diu.

Quintilian (35–96) ancient Roman rhetor

Book I, Chapter XII, 7; translation by H. E. Butler
De Institutione Oratoria (c. 95 AD)

“My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing to watch over, and care for, and be loyal to; institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death.”

Mark Twain book A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

Source: A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889), Ch. 13.

“Q: I understand that to walk the path one must do it alone. Why is it so much easier to do a yoga class in a group rather than to have the discipline of doing it alone?”

Baba Hari Dass (1923–2018) master yogi, author, builder, commentator of Indian spiritual tradition

Miscellaneous

“Justice is not fulfilled by good intentions alone; it demands institutional courage. When systems protect comfort over conscience, injustice becomes routine. A fair society is one where doing the right thing is structurally easier than doing the wrong one.”

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