He Who Justifies Himself Quotes & Sayings

Packed with fascinating personal perspective and testimony, Michael Takiffs A Complicated Man wholly justifies its title. The book is far more than a kaleidoscopic oral biography of President Bill Clinton. Aspect by aspect, it guides us through the struggles of postmodern America, as the most ambitious baby boomer of his generation seeks to modernize the Democratic Party-and, as in a Greek drama, is fated to be destroyed. Veritably, an all-American saga, with a cast of thousands-favorable and unfavorable. — Nigel Hamilton

The end justifies the means. But the end and the means are one. And if the means did not contribute to human happiness, neither will the end. — Eckhart Tolle

As soon as jealousy is discovered, it is regarded by the person who is its object as a challenge which justifies deception. — Marcel Proust

Sexism justifies itself by commandeering our logic and, quietly, the limits of what is constrict our ideas of what should be. Misogyny comes to taste like air, feel like gravity: so common we barely notice it, so entrenched it's hard to conceive of a world without it. So — Alexandra Brodsky

There are times when the end justifies the means. But when you build an argument based on a whole series of such times, you may find that you've constructed an entire philosophy of evil.
Luke Skywalker — Aaron Allston

Everything in the world bears witness of the use or misuse of man's inner talking. Negative inner talking, particularly evil and envious inner talking, are the breeding ground of the future battlefields and penitentiaries of the world. Through habit man has developed the secret affection for these negative inner conversations. Through them he justifies failure, criticizes his neighbors, gloats over the distress of others, and in general pours out his venom on all. Such misuse of the Word perpetuates the violence of the world. — Neville Goddard

We are able to persevere only because God works within us, within our free wills. And because God is at work in us, we are certain to persevere. The decrees of God concerning election are immutable. They do not change, because He does not change. All whom He justifies He glorifies. None of the elect has ever been lost. — R.C. Sproul

After investigating the government for more than two decades and authoring books on its secret programs, it's been my experience that the government does whatever the hell it wants, whenever the hell it wants, and justifies it later. — Anonymous

Apparently some people (who don't know history) seem to think that marriage 'always has been' exclusively between males and females - and that this modern inequality somehow justifies the enforced continuation of this inequality. — Christina Engela

It is faith alone that justifies, but faith that justifies can never be alone, though one is justified by faith alone, the faith which justifies is never in fact alone. — N. T. Wright

The Bible never speaks of God's grace as simply making up our deficiencies--as if salvation consists in so much good works (even a variable amount) plus so much of God's grace. Rather the Bible speaks of "a God who justifies the wicked" (Romans 4:5) who is found by those who do not seek Him, who reveals Himself to those who do not ask for Him (see Romans 10:20). — Jerry Bridges

The underlying struggle - between worlds of plenty and worlds of want; between the modern and the ancient; between those who embrace our teeming, colliding, irksome diversity, while still insisting on a set of values that binds us together, and those who would seek, under whatever flag or slogan or sacred text, a certainty and simplification that justifies cruelty toward those not like us ... — Barack Obama

This inductively justifies the conclusion that induction cannot justify any conclusions. — David Deutsch

When you travel as secretary, one problem you have is that the press comes with you and wants an immediate result because it justifies their trip. And sometimes the best result is that you don't try to get a result but try to get an understanding for the next time you go to them. — Henry A. Kissinger

When a holy was is declared, the end justifies any means to those crusaders. — Colleen Gleason

Self-betrayal" 1. An act contrary to what I feel I should do for another is called an act of "self-betrayal." 2. When I betray myself, I begin to see the world in a way that justifies my self-betrayal. 3. When I see the world in a self-justifying way, my view of reality becomes distorted. 4. So - when I betray myself, I enter the box. — The Arbinger Institute

The end justifies the means only when the means used are such as actually bring about the desired and desirable end. — John Dewey

Within the cult of Wall Street that forged Mitt Romney, making money justifies any behavior, no matter how venal. — Matt Taibbi

In the banking concept of education, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing ... The teacher presents himself to his students as their necessary opposite; by considering their ignorance absolute, he justifies his own existence. — Paulo Freire

A president who justifies his actions to the public might be induced to change them. A president who justifies his actions to himself, believing that he has the truth, is impervious to self-correction. — Carol Tavris

It's great to be anywhere as a writer. It saves you from implication in the ugliness of the place and justifies your being there. You can spend all day jerking off as long as you describe it well. — Richard Hell

Hunger justifies the middle classes. — Julien Torma

Terrorism': the word that means nothing, yet justifies everything. — Glenn Greenwald

Psychoanalysis justifies its importance by asserting that it forces you to look to and accept reality. But what sort of reality? A reality conditioned by the materialistic and scientific ideology of psychoanalysis, that is, a historical product ... — Mircea Eliade

I'm pretty sure there's no sexuality that justifies constant low-level harassment. — Mallory Ortberg

That's why you never hear politicians talking about 'citizens,' it's all 'taxpayers,' as though the salient fact of your relationship to the state is how much you pay. Like the state was a business and citizenship was a loyalty program that rewarded you for your custom with roads and health care. Zottas cooked the process so they get all the money and own the political process, pay as much or as little tax as they want. Sure, they pay most of the tax, because they've built a set of rules that gives them most of the money. Talking about 'taxpayers' means that the state's debt is to rich dudes, and anything it gives to kids or old people or sick people or disabled people is charity we should be grateful for, since none of those people are paying tax that justifies their rewards from Government Inc. — Cory Doctorow

There is an international disease which feeds on the notion that if you have a cause to defend, you can use any means to further your cause, since the end justifies the means. As an international community, we must oppose this notion, whether it be in Canada, in the United States, or anywhere else. No cause justifies violence as long as the system provides for change by peaceful means. — Richard M. Nixon

The principle that the end justifies the means is and remains the only rule of political ethics; anything else is just a vague chatter and melts away between one's fingers. — Arthur Koestler

Maybe there are moments between any two adults in love when the age of one of them dissolves before the other's eyes, when the first refuge of the soul at its creation is laid bare and skinless as a sunbeam through a window. Innocence and vulnerability, two unmeasurable quantities ... Perhaps that is the essence of the protection's intimacy, that it dwells in camouflage and justifies itself in stillness. — Marianne Wiggins

I really knew nothing about her, blinded as I was by that burning loveliness which replaces everything else and justifies everything — Vladimir Nabokov

In this great land of the free we call it human trafficking. And so long as we don't partake in the luxury, ignoring slavery is of no consequence. It is much easier to look away and ignore the victims. The person who ignores slavery justifies it by quickly deducting the victim is a willing participant hampered by misfortune. — D'Andre Lampkin

Here is a law which is above the King and which even he must not break. This reaffirmation of a supreme law and its expression in a general charter is the great work of Magna Carta; and this alone justifies the respect in which men have held it — Winston Churchill

When the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, He does so to bring us to repentance and, ultimately, to bring us to reconciliation with God, to forgiveness, to healing, and to cleansing. In other words, when the Spirit of God convicts us of sin, His entire purpose and entire motive is redemptive. When Satan accuses us, perhaps of the same sin, his purpose is to destroy us. That's why Paul says: "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. — R.C. Sproul

The Government justifies keeping everyone else in poverty because people seem to work the hardest when they're right on the edge of survival. — Margaret Peterson Haddix