Best Confucian Quotes

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.

When anger rises, think of the consequences.

Wherever you go, go with all your heart.

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

There is one God. The Jews and the Christians have no monopoly on God. I’m speaking about the same God the Hindus talk about, the same God the Muslims talk about, the same God that the Taoists and the Confucians talk about.

Study the past if you would define the future. –CONFUCIUS

The Confucian concept and Chinese ideograms for ‘woman’ and for ‘slave’ are the same.

A Confucian or Jewish love of learning would gain minorities far more than any affirmative action laws we might pass.

In the Confucian tradition is a simple formula that appeals to me deeply: ‘If there is righteousness in the heart, there will be beauty in the character. If there is beauty in the character, there will be harmony in the home. If there is harmony in the home, there will be order in the nation. If there is order in the nation, there will be peace in the world.’ I urge everyone to reflect deeply on these words, as simple as they are profound.

Take the serious side of Disney, the Confucian side of Disney. It’s in having taken an ethoswhere you have the values of courage and tenderness asserted in a way that everybody can understand. You have got an absolute genius there. You have got a greater correlation of nature than you have had since the time of Alexander the Great.

If a man withdraws his mind from the love of beauty, and applies it as sincerely to the love of the virtuous; if, in serving his parents, he can exert his utmost strength; if, in serving his prince, he can devote his life; if in his intercourse with his friends, his words are sincere – although men say that he has not learned, I will certainly say that he has.

He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good.

Fine words and an insinuating appearance are seldom associated with true virtue.

The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come.

Be not ashamed of mistakes and thus make them crimes.

He who exercises government by means of his virtue may be compared to the north polar star, which keeps its place and all the stars turn towards it.

The people may be made to follow a path of action but they may not be made to understand it.

If a man takes no thought about what is distant, he will find sorrow near at hand.

Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.

Study the past if you would define the future. I am not one who was born in the possession of knowledge; I am one who is fond of antiquity, and earnest in seeking it there. Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous.

To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage, or of principle.

To put the world in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the nation in order, we must first put the family in order; to put the family in order; we must first cultivate our personal life; we must first set our hearts right.

They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.

By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide apart.

Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous.

What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others.

Virtue is more to man than either water or fire. I have seen men die from treading on water and fire, but I have never seen a man die from treading the course of virtue.

I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.

I have not seen a person who loved virtue, or one who hated what was not virtuous. He who loved virtue would esteem nothing above it.

Men’s natures are alike; it is their habits that separate them.

Things that are done, it is needless to speak about…things that are past, it is needless to blame.

Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses.

Respect yourself and others will respect you.

Ignorance is the night of the mind, but a night without moon or star.

Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.