A Quote by John Locke

Good and evil, reward and punishment, are the only motives to a rational creature

John Locke

Quote Topics

Creature Evil Good Good And Evil Motives Only Punishment Rational Reward Reward And Punishment

Quote Author

John Locke
English - Philosopher
August 29, 1632 - October 28, 1704

When one has once accepted and absorbed Evil, it no longer demands the unfitness of the means. The ulterior motives with which youabsorb and assimilate Evil are not your own but those of Evil.... Evil is whatever distracts. Evil knows of the Good, but Good does not know of Evil. Knowledge of oneself is something only Evil has. One means that Evil has is the dialogue.... One cannot pay Evil in installments--and one always keeps on trying to.

Franz Kafka

The greatest cause of evil included all human motives in one giant paradox. Good and bad were so inextricably mixed that we couldn't make them out; bad seemed to lead to good, and good motives led to bad. The paradox is that evil comes from man's urge to heroic victory over evil.

Ernest Becker

The whole religion of Islam is based on reward and punishment and reward and punishment, and it becomes a part of how you think of everything. Even yourself.

Kumail Nanjiani

For the first time in history, the rational and the good are fully armed in the battle against evil. Here we finally find the answer to our paradox; now we can understand the nature of the social power held by evil. Ultimately, the evil, the irrational, truly has no power. The evil men’s control of morality is transient; it lives on borrowed time made possible only by the errors of the good. In time, as more honest men grasp the truth, evil’s stranglehold will be easily broken.

Andrew Bernstein

If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.

Albert Einstein

Man is said to be a rational creature; but should it not rather be said, that man is a creature capable of being rational, as we say a parrot is a creature capable of speech?

Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke

Pain is not a punishment. And pleasure is not a reward. You could argue that failure is not punishment and Success is not reward. They're just failure and success. You can choose how you respond.

Sarah Lewis

Annihilation itself is no death to evil. Only good where evil was, is evil dead. An evil thing must live with its evil until it chooses to be good. That alone is the slaying of evil.

George MacDonald

Whatever good you would do out of fear of punishment, or hope of reward hereafter, the Atheist would do simply because it is good; and being so, he would receive the far surer and more certain reward, springing from well-doing, which would constitute his pleasure, and promote his happiness.

Ernestine Rose

Evil is a completely different creature, Mac. Evil is bad that believes it's good.

Karen Marie Moning

We can only write well about our sins because it is too difficult to recall a virtuous act or even whether it was the result of good or evil motives.

Edward Dahlberg

Man can only experience good or evil in this world; if God wishes to punish or reward he can only do so during the life of man. it is therefore here below that the just must prosper and the impious suffer.

Kadmi Cohen

When anything is in the presence of evil, but is not as yet evil, the presence of good arouses the desire of good in that thing; but the presence of evil, which makes a thing evil, takes away the desire and friendship of the good; for that which was once both good and evil has now become evil only, and the good has no friendship with evil.

Plato

It is tempting to believe that social evils arise from the activities of evil men and that if only good men (like ourselves, naturally) wielded power, all would be well. That view requires only emotion and self-praise - easy to come by and satisfying as well. To understand why it is that 'good' men in positions of power will produce evil, while the ordinary man without power but able to engage in voluntary cooperation with his neighbors will produce good, requires analysis and thought, subordinating emotions to the rational.