Not that charity only which causes us to help the needy and comfort the suffering, but that feeling of universal philanthropy which, by teaching us to love, causes us to judge with lenity all men; striking at the root of
self-righteousness, and warning us to be sparing of our condemnation of others, while our own salvation is not yet secure.”
Their manner and attitudes were the last expression of complacent
self-righteousness. It was one anchorite's pride to lie naked in the mud and let the insects bite him and blister him unmolested; it was another's to lean against a rock, all day long, conspicuous to the admiration of the throng of pilgrims and pray; it was another's to go naked and crawl around on all fours; it was another's to drag about with him, year in and year out, eighty pounds of iron; it was another's to never lie down when he slept, but to stand among the thorn-bushes and snore when there were pilgrims around to look; a woman, who had the white hair of age, and no other apparel, was black from crown to heel with forty-seven years of holy abstinence from water.
God, our judge, Guard us against all arrogance, hypocrisy, and
self-righteousness,
Who will question the
self-righteousness of nations and their leaders?
Made temporary governor of Vienna by scheming Duke Vincentio, Angelo oozes
self-righteousness in his mission to clear the city of the debauchery that appals him.
And while eating organic has some impact, I'm sure, that impact is dwarfed by the colossal
self-righteousness of its practitioners.
There's a lot of screaming and
self-righteousness, and this puts any executive director under a lot of stress."
The portrait of George's unbending
self-righteousness is a microcosm of much of the Church's altitude toward the Jews both before and after the Shoah.
"The guru was possessed by desire,
self-righteousness and egoism and ordered the murder out of warped ideas," she read from a prepared statement during the hearing.
To Perkins' credit, while he clearly intends to humor us with mild ridicule of Limbaugh's pompous
self-righteousness, his own critique only pokes holes in the logical arguments of the man who says he can whip liberals with "half his brain tied behind his back." Perkins' intent is clearly not just to entertain but to motivate us as to why and how we all should become better critical reasoners.
But how rarely we see the
self-righteousness which is the other side of the coin.
"It is time to abandon denial,
self-righteousness, and scapegoating and to deal directly with the moral issues raised with [these] economic changes and by the last few decades of disinvestment in the younger generation," Coontz writes.