quotations about duty
Stern daughter of the voice of God!
O Duty! if that name thou love
Who art a light to guide, a rod
To check the erring and reprove.
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Ode to Duty
I thought the remnant of mine age
Should have been cherish'd by her child-like duty.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
The Two Gentlemen of Verona
Families are nothing other than the idolatry of duty.
ANN OAKLEY
Taking It Like a Woman
Duty doesn't need to call; it only needs to whisper. And if you heed the call, no matter what happens, you have no need for regret.
DEAN KOONTZ
Odd Apocalypse
If you lay duties upon people and give them no rights, you must pay them well.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
Death is lighter than a feather, but Duty is heavier than a mountain.
ROBERT JORDAN
To the Blight
The brave man wants no charms to encourage him to his duty, and the good man scorns all warnings that would deter him from fulfilling it.
EDWARD BULWER-LYTTON
Harold, the Last of the Saxon Kings
Every duty is great; great, because it tries our principle; great, because for the time being it tries our loyalty to conscience, and our energy and will.
E. H. CHAPIN
Living Words
Oh! Duty is an icy shadow. It will freeze you. It cannot fill the heart's sanctuary.
AUGUSTA JANE EVANS
Beulah
I give nothing as duties,
What others give as duties I give as living impulses
WALT WHITMAN
Leaves of Grass
You have your duty and your heart. To chose one means the other must suffer.
TOMI ADEYEMI
Children of Blood and Bone
Not once or twice in our fair island-story,
The path of duty was the way to glory.
ALFRED LORD TENNYSON
"Ode on the Death of Wellington"
Three things prompt men to a regular discharge of their duty in time of action: natural bravery, hope of reward, and fear of punishment.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
letter to the President of Congress, Feb. 9, 1776
No duty is imposed on the rich.
EUGENE EDINE POTTIER
The Internationale
If there is to be no satisfaction in pleasure, none in wisdom, none in ambition, none in the golden mean, what then? Ah, where then? In duty. In doing right because it is right.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Problems of Life: Selections from the Writings of Rev. Lyman Abbott
The idea of duty, that recognition of something to be lived for beyond the mere satisfaction of self, is to the moral life what the addition of a great central ganglion is to animal life. No man can begin to mould himself on a faith or an idea without rising to a higher order of experience: a principle of subordination, of self-mastery, has been introduced into his nature; he is no longer a mere bundle of impressions, desires, and impulses.
GEORGE ELIOT
Janet's Repentance
The brave man inattentive to his duty, is worth little more to his country, than the coward who deserts her in the hour of danger.
ANDREW JACKSON
speech to troops, Jan. 8, 1815
A man who refuses a duty ... is not punished ... but forsaken. And he will never know love or honor or happiness again.
S. M. STIRLING
The Sunrise Lands
Make it a point to do something every day that you don't want to do. This is the golden rule for acquiring the habit of doing your duty without pain.
MARK TWAIN
Following the Equator
The destiny of mankind is not decided by material computation. When great causes are on the move in the world ... we learn that we are spirits, not animals, and that something is going on in space and time beyond space and time, which whether we like it or not, spells duty.
WINSTON CHURCHILL
speech in Rochester, 1941