Cicero: “We must concern ourselves with the facts of everyday life as we find it--not imaginary and ideal perfections.”

But for all cases we have one rule, with which I desire you to be perfectly familiar: that which seems expedient must not be morally wrong; or, if it is morally wrong, it must not seem expedient.

Such acts of generosity are not to be so highly esteemed as those which are performed with judgment, deliberation, and mature consideration.

In the matter of a promise one must always consider the meaning and not the mere words.

For they secure one sort of justice, to be sure, in that they do no positive wrong to anyone, but they fall into the opposite injustice; for hampered by their pursuit of learning they leave to their fate those whom they ought to defend.