Honest Man Quotes

Revolution is necessarily inspired in justice and carries with it the aspiration for justice that every honest man has in his heart. ~ Mariano Azuela

The greatest want of the world is the want of men - men who will not be bought or sold; men who in their inmost souls are true and honest; men who do not fear to call sin by its right name; men whose conscience is as true to duty as the needle to the pole; men who will stand for the right though the heavens fall. ~ Ellen G. White

The universe is not rich enough to buy the vote of an honest man. ~ Pope Gregory I

Whether we are describing a king, an assassin, a thief, an honest man, a prostitute, a nun, a young girl, or a stallholder in a market, it is always ourselves that we are describing. ~ Guy De Maupassant

Every sensible man, every honest man, must hold the Christian sect in horror. But what shall we substitute in its place? you say. What? A ferocious animal has sucked the blood of my relatives. I tell you to rid yourselves of this beast, and you ask me what you shall put in its place ? ~ Voltaire

Black mail I suppose; an honest man paying through the nose for some of the capers of his youth. Black Mail House is what I call the place with the door, in consequence. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

A great nation is any mob of people which produces at least one honest man a century. ~ H.L. Mencken

Uxuriousness may be the last refuge of the honest man, ~ Mario Puzo

The life of an honest man must be a perpetual infidelity. ~ Charles Peguy

The most enviable praise of all is just to be called an honest man. ~ George Washington

How many honest men do you know? Take the sinners away from the saints, you're lucky to end up with Abraham Lincoln. ~ Paul Newman

The silly when deceived exclaim loudly; the fool complains; the honest man walks away and is silent. ~ Francois De La Noue

And whether you're an honest man, or whether you're a thief, depends on whose solicitor has given me my brief. ~ Benjamin Franklin

The criminals who, in the face of contumely, hatred or violence, have led the world to a higher standard and brought humanity to a diviner order, have so loved truth and righteousness as to defy the law, and in every age these men have met the life of outcasts, and the death of felons. Whatever may be said of the necessity of government to protect itself, no one can believe that any human being merits punishment for following his own highest ideal. Punishment can only be in any wise defended upon the theory that the individual is untrue to himself, that his heart is bad. But all schemes of human punishment seem specially contrived to exempt this class of men. Those who are untrue to themselves find no difficulty in obeying the state, or at least in seeming to be subservient to its laws. The cunning man without strong convictions of right and wrong can always find ample room to operate his trade inside the dead line the law lays down. Even Blackstone wrote that a man who governed his conduct solely by the law was neither an honest man nor a good citizen. The penal code cannot pretend to cover all the vicious acts of men. If there is a distinction between vicious acts and righteous acts, each are so numerous that even to catalogue them would be beyond the power of the state. ~ Clarence Darrow

A demagogue must be neither an educated nor an honest man; he has to be an ignoramus and a rogue. ~ Aristophanes

Truth and, by consequence, liberty, will always be the chief power of honest men. ~ Madame De Stael

Forget not, never forget that you have promised me to use this silver to become an honest man ... Jean Valjean, my brother: you belong no longer to evil, but to good. It is your soul that I am buying for you. I withdraw it from dark thoughts and from the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God! ~ Victor Hugo

They are so filthy and bestial that no honest man would admit one into his house for a water-closet doormat. ~ Charles Dickens

A rogue does not laugh in the same way that an honest man does; a hypocrite does not shed the tears of a man of good faith. All falsehood is a mask; and however well made the mask may be, with a little attention we may always succeed in distinguishing it from the true face. ~ Alexandre Dumas

So you're dating Mr. Freaky Vanderperv, at least you're not dating a guy with no skills and no interest in you sexually! Treat his kinks with respect and he will be an honest man with you always. ~ Roberto Hogue

I lie without a mask, thus I am an honest man. ~ Lionel Suggs

Honest men are few when it comes to themselves. ~ Mark Twain

Why does corruption in government always surprise us? Why do we expect anything else from it? Government is organized force. It takes our wealth and makes war. And we think honest men would do that work? ~ Joseph Sobran

The world had always loved the saint as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of God. Christ, through some divine instinct in him, seems to have always loved the sinner as being the nearest possible approach to the perfection of man. His primary desire was not to reform people, any more than his primary desire was to a relieve suffering. To turn an interesting thief into a tedious honest man was not his aim. He would have thought little of the Prisoners' Aid Society and other modern movements of the kind. The conversion of a publican into a Pharisee would not have seemed to him a great achievement. But in a manner not yet understood of the world he regarded sin and suffering as being in themselves beautiful holy things and modes of perfection.

It seems a very dangerous idea. It is - all great ideas are dangerous. That it was Christ's creed admits of no doubt. That it is the true creed I don't doubt myself.

Of course the sinner must repent. But why? Simply because otherwise he would be unable to realise what he had done. The moment of repentance is the moment of initiation. More than that: it is the means by which one alters one's past. The Greeks thought that impossible. They often say in their Gnomic aphorisms, 'Even the Gods cannot alter the past.' Christ showed that the commonest sinner could do it, that it was the one thing he could do. Christ, had he been asked, would have said - I feel quite certain about it - that the moment ~ Oscar Wilde

Thanksgiving Day comes, by statute, once a year; to the honest man it comes as frequently as the heart of gratitude will allow. ~ Edward Sandford Martin

Reminds me of something my grandfather would say. He'd say, "I'm goin' upstairs to fuck your grandmother." He was an honest man, and he wasn't going to bullshit a four-year-old. ~ George Carlin

Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure that there is one less scoundrel in the world. ~ Thomas Carlyle

Every honest man lives for himself. Every man worth calling a man lives for himself. The one who doesn't - doesn't live at all. ~ Ayn Rand

an honest man is the man who keeps his own counsel, and will not divide the plunder. ~ Honore De Balzac

All my fears and cares are of this world; if there is another, an honest man has nothing to fear from it. ~ Robert Burns

Time is the only test of honest men, one day is space enough to know a rogue. ~ Sophocles

A honest man is seldom a vagrant. ~ Cato The Younger

He turned from the sight of human ignorance and human fate and the sea eating the ground we stand on, which, had he been able to contemplate it fixedly might have led to something; and found consolation in trifles so slight compared with the august theme just now before him that he was disposed to slur that comfort over, to deprecate it, as if to be caught happy in a world of misery was for an honest man the most despicable of crimes. ~ Virginia Woolf

The main trouble with being an honest man was that it lost you all your illusions. ~ James Jones

In the land of bleating sheep and braying jackasses, one brave and honest man is bound to create a scandal. ~ Edward Abbey

The thieves and killers are goin' to have guns, so if the honest men don't have 'em they just make it easier for the vicious. ~ Louis L'Amour

An honest Man will receive neither Money nor Praise that is not his due. ~ Benjamin Franklin

As long as men did nothing except to render their fellows wretched; as long as they only butchered and burnt the innocent and helpless, God maintained the strictest and most heartless neutrality. But when some honest man, some great and tender soul expressed a doubt as to the truth of the Scriptures, or prayed to the wrong God, or to the right one by the wrong name, then the real God leaped like a wounded tiger upon his victim, and from his quivering flesh tore his wretched soul. ~ Robert G. Ingersoll

I mind how I said to you once that there is a price for being good the same as for being bad; a cost to pay. And it's the good men that cant deny the bill when it comes around. They cant deny it for the reason that there aint any way to make them pay it, like a honest man that gambles. The bad men can deny it; that's why dont anybody expect them to pay on sight or any other time. But the good cant. Maybe it takes longer to pay for being good than for being bad. ~ William Faulkner

'Tis certain that a serious attention to the sciences and liberal arts softens and humanizes the temper, and cherishes those fine emotions in which true virtue and honor consist. It rarely, very rarely happens that a man of taste and learning is not, at least, an honest man, whatever frailties may attend him. ~ David Hume

I'd rather get bad news from an honest man than lies from a flatterer, ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

An honest man in politics shines more there than he would elsewhere.
- A Tramp Abroad ~ Mark Twain

Formed on the good old plan, A true and brave and downright honest man! He blew no trumpet in the market-place, Nor in the church with hypocritic face Supplied with cant the lack of Christian grace; Loathing pretence, he did with cheerful will What others talked of while their hands were still. ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

Where the principle of difference [between political parties] is as substantial and as strongly pronounced as between the republicans and the monocrats of our country, I hold it as honorable to take a firm and decided part and as immoral to pursue a middle line, as between the parties of honest men and rogues, into which every country is divided. ~ Thomas Jefferson

An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going. ~ Francis Crick

A thoroughly honest man is a rare jewel in the shallow stream of meaningless pebbles. ~ Kristian Goldmund Aumann

It is because of the Biblical curse on man's search for knowledge, which has so paralyzed his mind during the past ages, and its detrimental effect upon progress, that makes the Bible the most wicked, the most detestable, the most pernicious, and the most obnoxious book ever published. It has been a curse to the human race.
It is the duty of every brave and honest man and woman to do everything in his and her power to destroy the influence of this utterly stupid and vicious book, with its infantile concept of life and its nonsense concerning the universe. It is their duty to do everything within their power to stop its demoralizing and paralyzing influence upon the life of man.
We will never achieve intellectual liberty until the wickedness of this book has been discarded with the belief in the flatness of the earth. ~ Joseph Lewis

What honest man would not rather be the sufferer than the defrauder? ~ Samuel Richardson

Every honest man will suppose honest acts to flow from honest principles, and the rogues may rail without intermission. ~ Thomas Jefferson

Esau was an hunter - And a man that knew how to live by his wits, for he was a cunning hunter. A man of the field - All for the game, and never so well but as when he was in pursuit of it. And Jacob was a plain man - An honest man, that dealt fairly. And dwelt in tents - Either, As a shepherd, loving that safe and silent employment of keeping sheep, to which also he bred up his children, Gen 46:34. Or, As a student, he frequented the tents of Melchizedek or Heber, as some understand it, to be taught by them divine things. ~ John Wesley

An honest man and an honest woman may be insulted, but to tell a thief he's a thief is simply la constatation d'un fait. ~ Leo Tolstoy

No honest man will argue on every side ~ Sophocles

An honest man will continue to be so though surrounded on all sides by rogues. ~ Charles Caleb Colton

If an honest man is the noblest work of God, then Mr. Lincoln's title to high nobility is clear and unquestioned. ~ Matthew Simpson

There is no more light in a genius than in any other honest man
but he has a particular kind of lens to concentrate this light into a burning point. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

Any doctrine that will not bear investigation is not a fit tenant for the mind of an honest man. Any doctrine that will not bear investigation is not a fit tenant for the mind of an honest man. Any man who is afraid to have his doctrine investigated is not only a coward but a hypocrite. ~ Robert G. Ingersoll

I have no idea what the mind of a lowlife scoundrel is like, but I know what the mind of an honest man is like; it is terrifying. ~ Abel Hermant

The trite saying that honesty is the best policy has met with the just criticism that honesty is not policy. The real honest man is honest from conviction of what is right, not from policy. ~ Robert E.Lee

Humanity is not perfect in any fashion; no more in the case of evil than in that of good. The criminal has his virtues, just as the honest man has his weaknesses. ~ Pierre-Ambroise Choderlos De Laclos

Human nature is so weak that the honest men who have no religion make me fret with their perilous virtue, as rope-dancers with their dangerous equilibrium. ~ Francis De Gaston, Chevalier De Levis

Even the best intentioned of great men need a few scoundrels around them; there are some things you cannot ask an honest man to do. ~ Jean De La Bruyere

It's amazing how much panic one honest man can spread among a multitude of hypocrites. ~ Thomas Sowell

An honest man is a rare treasure. ~ Jim Butcher

Where's the bride-to-be?" Beckett held his arms open for Kyle and gave her a gentle hug. "Good on you, Fairy Princess, making an honest man out of my boy here. Jesus was treating him like shit; he was never getting laid. I hope you two have a million damn kids and name them all Beckett, boys or girls."
Kyle returned the hug and smirked. "We might name our dog Beckett, if you're lucky."
Beckett laughed a bit too loudly. He seemed desperate to make up for lost time. ~ Debra Anastasia

Marry me and make an honest man of me in my butler's
eyes." He kissed her. "Marry me and save me from having to chase loose women for the rest of my life."
He kissed her again. "Marry me, darling," he said once more against her lips. "Because I adore you. ~ Laura Lee Guhrke

The only question which any wise man can ask himself, and which any honest man will ask himself, is whether a doctrine is true or false. ~ Thomas Huxley

Daughter! Get you an honest Man for a Husband, and keep him honest. No matter whether he is rich, provided he be independent. Regard the Honour and moral Character of the Man more than all other Circumstances. Think of no other Greatness but that of the soul, no other Riches but those of the Heart. An honest, Sensible humane Man, above all the Littlenesses of Vanity, and Extravagances of Imagination, labouring to do good rather than be rich, to be usefull rather than make a show, living in a modest Simplicity clearly within his Means and free from Debts or Obligations, is really the most respectable Man in Society, makes himself and all about him the most happy. ~ John Adams

Though this motion for a new trial is an application to the discretion of the Court, it must be remembered that the discretion to be exercised on such an occasion is not a wild but a sound discretion, and to be confined within those limits within which an honest man, competent to discharge the duties of his office, ought to confine himself. And that discretion will be best exercised by not deviating from the rules laid down by our predecessors; for the practice of the Court forms the law of the Court. ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

Women love an honest man. ~ Rita Ora

To remain silent is out of the question for a strong and honest man. ~ Erik Larson

Why, when no honest man will deny in private that every ultimate problem is wrapped in the profoundest mystery, do honest men proclaim in pulpits that unhesitating certainty is the duty of the most foolish and ignorant? Is it not a spectacle to make the angels laugh? ~ Leslie Stephen

When he thought of the old man he could see him suddenly in a field in the spring, trying to move a gray boulder. He always knew instinctively the ones you could move, even though the greater part was buried in the earth, and he expected you to move the rock and not discuss it. A hard and silent man, an honest man, a noble man. Little humor but sometimes the door opened and you saw the warmth within a long way off, a certain sadness, a slow, remote, unfathomable quality as if the man wanted to be closer to the world but did not know how. Once Chamberlain had a speech memorized from Shakespeare and gave it proudly, the old man listening but not looking, and Chamberlain remembered it still: 'What a piece of work is man...in action how like an angel!' And the old man, grinning, had scratched his head and then said stiffly, 'Well, boy, if he's an angel, he's sure a murderin' angel.' And Chamberlain had gone on to school to make an oration on the subject: Man, the Killer Angel. And when the old man heard about it he was very proud, and Chamberlain felt very good remembering it. The old man was proud of his son, the colonel. ~ Michael Shaara

I tell you before God, and as an honest man, your son is the greatest composer known to me by person and repute, he has taste and what is more the greatest skill in composition. (Said to Leopold Mozart) ~ Joseph Haydn

Truth from the mouth of an honest man and severity from a good-natured man have a double effect. ~ William Hazlitt

Pliny is a leech," I say. "A liar as much as you're an honest man."
"And that makes him dangerous. Liars make the best promises. ~ Pierce Brown

Honest men are the gentlemen of nature. ~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

The value of a gift is much enhanced by sparing an honest man the misery of asking for it with confusion and blushes. ~ Anonymous

Many an honest man practices upon himself an amount of deceit sufficient, if practised upon another, and in a little different way, to send him to the state prison. ~ Christian Nestell Bovee

When we walk in, everybody turns to look at us. Pres looks down at our joined hands and then looks to Knox. I open my mouth to say something, but he beats me to it.

Of course he does.

"Yo. Little announcement here. Violent Violet and I are together. She's my old lady and I'm her old man. Yada yada yada, we're getting married. So there's that."

I look at him, and I feel my jaw pop open. "Did you just yada yada your proposal to me?"

Knox shrugs like it's no big deal. "Wasn't going to let you tell me no."

The big scarred-up guy comes over and gives him a high five. "Best way to do it," he says and pats Knox on the back.

"About time you made an honest man out of him," Pres says, walking over and giving me a hug. I feel Knox's hand tighten, and he doesn't let it go while I awkwardly try to hug the guy back.

"We're all a family here now, and it's going to stay that way. We agreed that you're patched in, regardless if you marry this nerd or not."

I lean into Knox and laugh. "Thank you."

"Welcome to the Ghost Riders," Pres says, and suddenly I hear a champagne cork pop and we're all being sprayed with suds.

I try to turn into Knox's chest, but he holds me in front of him so I get covered.

As more champagne is popped and more bottles get poured, Knox spins me in his arms and raises me up so we are at eye level.

"I love you, baby," he says, kissing me on ~ Alexa Riley

An honest man with an open Bible and a pad and pencil is sure to find out what is wrong with him very quickly. ~ Aiden Wilson Tozer

Now I was, as they said, become godly; now I was become a right honest man. But oh! when I understood these were their words and opinions of me, it pleased me mighty well. For, though as yet I was nothing but a poor painted hypocrite, yet, I loved to be talked of as one that was truly godly. ~ John Bunyan

I've seen a rich man beg, I've seen a good man sin
I've seen a tough man cry, I've seen a loser win
And a sad man grin, I heard an honest man lie
I've seen the good side of bad and the downside of up
And everything between

I licked the silver spoon, drank from the golden cup
And smoked the finest green
I stroked the fattest dimes at least a couple of times
Before I broke their heart
You know where it ends, yo, it usually depends on where you start ~ Everlast

Rakes are more suspicious than honest men. ~ Samuel Richardson

Upon the great questions of origin, of destiny, of immortality, of ... other worlds, every honest man must say, 'I do not know.' Upon these questions, this is the creed of intelligence. ~ Robert Green Ingersoll

I read five books on the Constitution. My favorite was 'Plain, Honest Men' by Richard Beeman. I went on a science jag in the same way. I kept getting in arguments about evolution and being bested. So I read Charles Darwin's 'On the Origin of the Species,' a fantastic book that is not that difficult. ~ Denis O'Hare

Darks drifts covered the horizon. A strange shadow approaching nearer and nearer, was spreading little by little over men, over things, over ideas; a shadow which came from indignations and from systems. All that had been hurriedly stifled was stirring and fermenting. Sometimes the conscious of the honest man caught its breath, there was so much confusion in that air in which sophisms were mingled with truths. Minds trembled in the social anxiety like leaves at the approach of the storm. The electric tension was so great that at certain moments any chance-comer, thought unknown, flashed out. Then the twilight darkness fell again. At intervals, deep and sullen mutterings enabled men to judge of the amount of lightning in the cloud. ~ Victor Hugo

A man should know about himself two or three things: whether he is a coward; whether he is an honest man or given to lies; whether he is an ambitious man. One should define oneself first of all in those terms, and only then in terms of culture, race, creed. ~ Joseph Brodsky

The author of McCarthyism was given the distinction of addressing the Republican National Convention. This strikes terror in the hearts of honest men. ~ Emanuel Celler

HE who says there is no such thing as an honest man, you may be sure is himself a knave. ~ George Bishop Berkeley

In a kingdom of thieves, the ways of an honest man will always be a crime. ~ Dennis Adonis

The liar is no whit better than the thief, and if his mendacity takes the form of slander he may be worse than most thieves. It puts a premium upon knavery untruthfully to attack an honest man, or even with hysterical exaggeration to assail a bad man with untruth. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

God works wonders now and then; Behold a lawyer, an honest man. ~ Benjamin Franklin

The wishes of an honest man do not stretch beyond what he undoubtedly deserves. ~ Eraldo Banovac

With a woman, always make good use of a secret. She will be proportionally grateful to you, like a scoundrel who grants his respect to an honest man he has been unable to swindle. ~ Honore De Balzac

The holy spirit means the invisible power of Jehovah, holy because he is holy. This power of Jehovah operated upon the minds of honest men who loved and who were devoted to righteousness, directing them in the writing of the Bible. ~ Joseph Franklin Rutherford

What is the world coming to when an honest man cannot burn corpses without suspicion? asked Nothing. ~ Joe Abercrombie

You couldn't listen to honest man whom you hate. ~ Toba Beta

He made an honest woman of me. It's a curious expression, don't you agree? An 'honest woman' is a very different creature from an 'honest man' and has nothing to do with the truth or lack thereof. Just as a woman's honor is a very different thing from a man's. It's as if when it comes to women, all possible virtues - honesty, honor, even virtue itself - are reduced simply to whom we allow between our legs. ~ C.S. Harris

Well, it's a choice like any other, even though it's stupid to believe we can control the world and to allow ourselves to be lulled into a false sense of security that leaves us totally unprepared for life; because then, when you least expect it, an earthquake throws up a range of mountains, a bolt of lightning kills a tree that was preparing for its summer rebirth, or a hunting accident puts paid to the life of an honest man. ~ Paulo Coelho

There are three difficulties in authorship: to write anything worth publishing, to find honest men to publish it, and to find sensible men to read it. ~ Charles Caleb Colton