Justify

Famous quotes containing the word justify:

“Often, the less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)

“A pun does not commonly justify a blow in return. But if a blow were given for such cause, and death ensued, the jury would be judges both of the facts and of the pun, and might, if the latter were of an aggravated character, return a verdict of justifiable homicide.”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)

“The compelled mother loves her child as the caged bird sings. The song does not justify the cage nor the love the enforcement.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)