Ought Quotes

What ought to be done is neglected, what ought not to be done is done; the desires of unruly, thoughtless people are always increasing.

If I'm the people's poet, then I ought to be in people's hands - and, I hope, in their heart.

I think we ought to give ourselves more time. We should be more patient with ourselves and with each other.

I lay there in my black slip dress and wondered if I ought to have worn pants. I mean, who knew what I was going to find up there? What if I had to do some climbing? People might see my underwear.

he'd know that I think that . . . well, that bending an enemy's will through military force is the absolute last way a nation ought to go about solving their problems.

. . .I really ought to have recognized it for what it was and, perhaps, to have stopped right there - for it was nostalgia, and what inspires nostalgia has been dead a long time

I think whites are used to being in power, so when whites think we ought to have integrated churches they think, "People ought to come to our church. What can we do to get them to come?"

Russia ought to get Iran to back out of the proxy wars they are involved in.

When you work on a character, you form in your mind an image of what he ought to look like. Then you go and find one who resembles him.

Historians ought to be precise, faithful, and unprejudiced; and neither interest nor fear, hatred nor affection, should make them swerve from the way of truth.

We ought to be people of compassion. And being people of compassion means we deny ourselves, and our self centeredness.

You ought to try being cruel to some people.

Everybody ought to listen to Benny [Carter]. He's a whole musical education.

I'm in favor of doing tax reform, but I think tax reform ought to be revenue neutral as it was back during the [Ronald] Reagan years. We've resolved this issue.

What we do know is that the American people, regardless of how they feel about the abortion issue, don't think that taxpayer money ought to be used to pay for abortions.

We ought to make sure that the eligibility for entitlements meets the demographics of America.

I think the minimum wage outght to keep pace with inflation. I think the minimum wage is a good thing to have in our country and I think it ought to be updated.

I think the minimum wage ought to keep pace with inflation.

I'm offended by the is-ought fallacy, which has been used to justify slavery, women not being allowed to vote, children working in factories.

One ought not to encourage beggars, and yes, you are right, it is far better to donate to charities that address the causes of poverty rather than to him, a creature who is merely its symptom.

If it ought to be done, then apply yourself to it strenuously

War is a lottery in which nations ought to risk nothing but small amounts.

Policemen and prisons ought never to be the means used to bring men back to the practice of religion.

Tragedy warms the soul, elevates the heart, can and ought to create heroes. In this sense, perhaps, France owes a part of her great actions to Corneille.

Margot [Hentoff] dislikes Bill Clinton because he's totally untrustworthy, and you really ought to have some faith in whoever's going to be your president.

I've I call [Cardinal John O'Connor] from time to time and he calls me. And when I think there's something he ought to think about doing, I call him and he usually does it.

I don't think you should ever insult people unintentionally: if you're doing it, you ought to mean it.

I always say that if you're a novelist, the challenge is not writing what you think ought to happen, but trying in some way to write what did happen in a world that doesn't necessarily exist.

Somebody ought to have the courage to tell the truth. These people are terrorists.

My approach is that all policy ought to be evidence-based.

Wikileaks is a democratizing force. Its giving individuals access to decisions and thinking by their representatives and in a democracy that ought to be reflexive.

You ought to teach kids that elections take place but that's not politics. If you want to know how legislation is made it doesn't come from elections.

You always ought to have tom cats arranged, you know - it makes 'em more companionable.

If he [Hugo Chavez] thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it.

The paranoid fear of government is an extremist position, and every one of us ought to say that

Crossroads, what a disaster. Hundreds of millions of dollars wasted and no one is held responsible....people ought to be asking, 'What are you in business for?'

When you're young, you keep reading new writers and you keep changing your mind about how you ought to sound.

Hollywood is a changing world these days. This is one of the things that ought to be changed.

I believe there can be dignity in the acting profession. And I think there ought to be more dignity in the publicity an actor gets.

The sicker and the older you get, the more support you ought to get.

People don't care to read what they already think or what any people think - they know all that well enough. They want to know what they ought to think.

From that house there has come so much life that it ought never to die or fall into ruin... For me that house was a gateway to America.

A poet, as he is the author to others of the highest wisdom, pleasure, virtue, and glory, so he ought personally to be the happiest, the best, the wisest, and the most illustrious of men.

[Examiners] spend their lives in discovering which pages of a text-book a man ought to read and which will not be likely to 'pay'.

It's not fair to say that people who work with their head or with their hands ought to pay taxes, but people who earn their living with capital ought not to.

Fine thoughts are wealth, for the right use of which Men are and ought to be accountable,-- If not to Thee, to those they influence.

In my view, we ought to replace the notion of analytic philosophy by that of synthetic philosophy.

The e-book revolution has made it very easy to pay writers a good deal less than what their work is worth. I do strongly believe that we writers ought to hold out for much better royalties.

We whine about things we have little control over; we lament what we believe ought to be changed.

You ought to be able to grow up in a place and not have to get the hell out of it when you turn eighteen.