Top 650 Motive Quotes & Sayings

Where there is no emotion, there is no motive for violence.

If a motive affects me, and I am compelled to act on it because it proves to be the 'strongest' of its kind, then the thought of freedom ceases to have any meaning. How should it matter to me whether I can do a thing or not, if I am forced by the motive to do it?

Everybody who talks to a newspaper has a motive. That's just a given. And good reporters always, repeat always, probe to find out what that motive is.

In work we act under the predominant motive of external, rational necessities; in pleasure, under the predominant motive of other, equally general necessities of human nature. Rest or recreation is the element in which the personality seeks to renew its strength from these stimuli that exhaust the reserve of human resources. It's an element introduced into life by the person himself.

The meaning of what is said is according to the motive for saying it: because things are not subject to speech, but speech to things. Therefore we should take account of the motive of the lawgiver, rather than of his very words.

I believe that the human motive to share is very powerful. The human motive to profit is also very powerful, and I think that the profit motive and the sharing motive are not exclusive.

The truth of the matter is, Satan and God may want the exact same event to take place - but for different reasons. Satan's motive in Jesus' crucifixion was rebellion; God's motive was love and mercy. Satan was a secondary cause behind the Crucifixion, but it was God who ultimately wanted it, willed it, and allowed Satan to carry it out. And the same holds true for disease.

... I'm not conscious of the speed ... it's not my motive ... my motive is displaying a voice through the fingerboard ... it can get to the point where I don't have control over what I am playing ... I never end the gig until I can't sing anymore

Vanity is a motive of immense potency.

In the motive lies the good or ill.

The distance is nothing when one has a motive.

If the Lord is coming soon, is this not a very practical motive for greater missionary effort? I know of no other motive that has been so stimulating to myself.

The motive of fear is the be-all and end-all of religion.

The motive power is the cause of all life.

No one does anything from a single motive.

Evil is an attack against human spiritual development and enlightenment. All evil, badness, neurosis - it has one motive and one motive only, which is to destroy - to destroy your chance of arising above yourself.

You don't have to have the capitalistic profit motive philosophy.

The motive power of democracy is love

No man does anything from a single motive.

Most of the people who have grabbed hold of climate change and greenhouse gases, pollution, oil dependency - they have another motive, and their motive is to attain the appearance of virtue without having actually done anything virtuous.

Reason, in a strict sense, as meaning the judgment of truth and falsehood, can never, of itself, be any motive to the will, and can have no influence but so far as it touches some passion or affection. Abstract relations of ideas are the object of curiosity, not of volition. And matters of fact, where they are neither good nor evil, where they neither excite desire nor aversion, are totally indifferent, and whether known or unknown, whether mistaken or rightly apprehended, cannot be regarded as any motive to action.

Conviction is a good motive, but a bad judge.

The motive, if you are to find inner peace, must be an outgoing motive. Service, of course-service. Giving, not getting. Your motive must be good if your work is to have good effect. The secret of life is being of service.

The only motive that can keep politics pure is the motive of doing good for one's country and its people.

My motive, and I will make it clear and look you in the eyes, is to attack major league baseball. That's my motive.

I talk to groups studying the most advanced spiritual teachings and sometimes these people wonder why nothing is happening in their lives. Their motive is the attainment of inner peace for themselves - which of course is a selfish motive. You will not find it with this motive. The motive, if you are to find inner peace, must be an outgoing motive. Service, of course, service. Giving, not getting. Your motive must be good if your work is to have good effect. The secret of life is being of service.

Almost all education has a political motive: it aims at strengthening some group, national or religious or even social, in the competition with other groups. It is this motive, in the main, which determines the subjects taught, the knowledge offered and the knowledge withheld, and also decides what mental habits the pupils are expected to acquire. Hardly anything is done to foster the inward growth of mind and spirit; in fact, those who have had the most education are very often atrophied in their mental and spiritual life.

Not rarely, and this is especially true of wives and mothers, the motive behind assuming a disproportionate share of work and responsibility is completely unselfish. We want to protect, to spare those of whom we are fond. We forget that, regardless of the motive, the results of such action are almost always destructive and unproductive.

I'm not trying to teach anybody anything, I'm not trying to say anything, I have no political motive whatsoever. My motive is just the big laugh.

The motive force of history is truth and not lies.

People instinctively know the difference between something done with a profit motive and something done with a love motive.

Where destruction is the motive, unity is dangerous. For example, if I have evil intent and I galvanize that evil intent with many others, the capacity to destroy is immense. Where goodness is the motive, unity is phenomenal and actually has some good issues to it.

Almost all education has a political motive.

Every line, everything you do in life, should have a motive and a reason. Every one of us should have a motive and a reason, most of the time, to accomplish all the things that we want in life.

Modern authoritarianism, as it's growing inside Europe and now coming to the United States, rests much more on the use of power to protect the guilty than to persecute the innocent. And its motive is not crazy totalitarian utopianism, it's motive is repressive kleptocracy. To steal and to use the powers of the state to protect theft.

Is hacking ever acceptable? It depends on the motive.

The key to motivation is motive.

The motive of success is not enough.

Love is the motive, but justice is the instrument.

Motivation is motive in action.

The noblest motive is the public good.

Effort plus motive equals result.

We are not wise enough, pure enough, or strong enough to aim and sustain such a single motive over a lifetime. That way lies fanaticism or failure. But if the single motive is the master motivation of God's calling, the answer is yes. In any and all situations, both today and tomorrow's tomorrow, God's call to us is the unchanging and ultimate whence, what, why, and whither of our lives. Calling is a 'yes' to God that carries a 'no' to the chaos of modern demands. Calling is the key to tracing the story line of our lives and unriddling the meaning of our existence in a chaotic world.

Every relationship has one or the other motive behind it. Friendship or enemity are not purposeless.Oneness of motive is turned into friendship. While diversity of motive cause enemity. Royal relationships also depend uypon one or theother purpose. But such relatins ar mainly for the welfare of the state.

That man is the most loyal who aims at the noblest motive, and that motive the public good.

Watch your motive before God; have no other motive in prayer than to know Him.

Obviously, Jews gain certain advantages by promoting the Holocaust idea. It inspires tremendous financial aid for Israel. It makes organized Jewry almost immune from criticism. Whether the Holocaust is real or not, the Jews clearly have a motive for fostering the idea that it occurred. Not only do they have a motive, but they have the means with the media domination they now hold.

Never mistake motive for action.

A wrong motive involves defeat.

POCKET, n. The cradle of motive and the grave of conscience. In woman this organ is lacking; so she acts without motive, and her conscience, denied burial, remains ever alive, confessing the sins of others.

Profit per se is not my motive.

The motive power of democracy is love.

It is the man that makes the motive, and not the motive the man.

Because we are saturated with life, because we are human, our strongest motive is life, humanity; and the stronger the motive back of the line the stronger, and therefore more beautiful, the line will be.

We rarely do anything with on single motive.

There are people who do everything for a calculative political motive. My only motive is a human motive.

The main question ... is not what motive inspired the law, but what it will be possible for men of bad motive to do with the law.

Where destruction is the motive, unity is dangerous.

A politician or political thinker who calls himself a political realist is usually boasting that he sees politics, so to speak, in the raw; he is generally a proclaimed cynic and pessimist who makes it his business to look behind words and fine speeches for the motive. This motive is always low.

He who has no passion has no principal or motive to act.