“Human attempts to construct moral order are always precarious: If righteousness too often leads to self-righteousness, the demand for justice can lead to one guillotine or another.”
“...guilt leads to righteous action, but rarely is it the right action.”
“Self-righteousness is the inevitable fruit of simple moral judgments.”
“Do not all theists insist that there can be no morality, no justice, honesty or fidelity without the belief in a Divine Power? Based upon fear and hope, such morality has always been a vile product, imbued partly with self-righteousness, partly with hypocrisy. As to truth, justice, and fidelity, who have been their brave exponents and daring proclaimers? Nearly always the godless ones: the Atheists; they lived, fought, and died for them. They knew that justice, truth, and fidelity are not conditioned in heaven, but that they are related to and interwoven with the tremendous changes going on in the social and material life of the human race; not fixed and eternal, but fluctuating, even as life itself.”
“Perhaps you confuse virtue and convention, gentlemen. Conventionality is not morality, and self-righteousness is not religion.”
“When you think yours is the only true path you forever chain yourself to judging others and narrow the vision of God. The road to righteousness and arrogance is a parallel road that can intersect each other several times throughout a person's life. It’s often hard to recognize one road from another. What makes them different is the road to righteousness is paved with the love of humanity. The road to arrogance is paved with the love of self.”