Duty Quotes

500+ Sourced quotes

I feel that I have fulfilled the part of my duty that tied me to the Cuban revolution in its territory, and I say farewell to you, to the comrades, to your people, who now are mine.

Rarely has any people enjoyed greater prosperity than we are now enjoying. For this we render heartfelt and solemn thanks to the Giver of Good; and we seek to praise Him -not by words only -but by deeds, by the way in which we do our duty to ourselves and to our fellow men.

Theodore Roosevelt

On an occasion of this kind it becomes more than a moral duty to speak one's mind. It becomes a pleasure.

A wretched parent who claims obedience from his children, without first doing his duty by them, excites nothing but contempt.

Life is action, the use of one's powers. As to use them to their height is our joy and duty, so it is the one end that justifies itself.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

The dignity of the artist lies in his duty of keeping awake the sense of wonder in the world.

G. K. Chesterton

Propaganda in favor of action that is consonant with enlightened self-interest appeals to reason by means of logical arguments based upon the best available evidence fully and honestly set forth. Propaganda in favor of action dictated by the impulses that are below self-interest offers false, garbled or incomplete evidence, avoids logical argument and seeks to influence its victims by the mere repetition of catchwords, by the furious denunciation of foreign or domestic scapegoats, and by cunningly associating the lower passions with the highest ideals, so that atrocities come to be perpetrated in the name of God and the most cynical kind of Realpolitik is treated as a matter of religious principle and patriotic duty.

If there is anything which it is the duty of the whole people to never entrust to any hands but their own, that thing is the preservation and perpetuity of their own liberties and institutions.

Abraham Lincoln

The first duty of a lecturer: to hand you after an hour's discourse a nugget of pure truth to wrap up between the pages of your notebooks, and keep on the mantel-piece forever.

Every step of progress means a duty repudiated, and a scripture torn up.

George Bernard Shaw

God bless thee; and put meekness in thy breast, Love, charity, obedience, and true duty!

William Shakespeare

Our duty to ourselves, to posterity, and to mankind, call on us
by every motive which is sacred or honorable, to watch over the safety of our beloved country
during the troubles which agitate and convulse the residue of the world, and to sacrifice to
that all personal and local considerations.

Thomas Jefferson

The unexpected ought always to be expected by Science. Her duty is to stop it in its course and search it, rejecting the chimerical, establishing the real.

To encourage literature and the arts is a duty which every good citizen owes to his country.

George Washington

I should like to believe my people's religion, which was just what I could wish, but alas, it is impossible. I have really no religion, for my God, being a spirit shown merely by reason to exist, his properties utterly unknown, is no help to my life. I have nor the parson's comfortable doctrine that every good action has its reward, and every sin is forgiven. My whole religion is this: do every duty, and expect no reward for it, either here or hereafter.

Bertrand Russell

The truly brave are soft of heart and eyes, and feel for what their duty bids them do.

I do not so much rejoice that God hath made me to be a Queen, as to be a Queen over so thankful a people. Therefore I have cause to wish nothing more than to content the subject and that is a duty which I owe. Neither do I desire to live longer days than I may see your prosperity and that is my only desire.

Elizabeth I of England

It is highly interesting to our country, and it is the duty of its functionaries, to provide that every citizen in it should receive an education proportioned to the condition and pursuits of his life.

Thomas Jefferson

The very right to vote imposes on me the duty to instruct myself in public affair, however little influence my voice may have in them.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

So inscrutable is the arrangement of causes and consequences in this world, that a two-penny duty on tea, unjustly imposed in a sequestered part of it, changes the condition of all its inhabitants.

Thomas Jefferson

God assigns as a duty to every man the dignity of every woman.

Pope John Paul II

In the United States, politics is a profession, whereas in Europe it is a right and a duty.

You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful.

As a son of this country [Croatia], I consider it my duty to help the City of Zagreb in every way, either through counsel or through action.

When the hour comes for dealing with slavery, I trust I will be willing to do my duty though it cost my life.

Abraham Lincoln