Ed T.:

My parents raised me with Kant's Catagorical Imperitive as the core of our family's moral code. ... My father, especially, talked about the Imperitive, and how he believed its First Formulation (paraphrased as: "Act in such a way as you would like to see become univesal") was a step higher on the moral ladder than even the Golden Rule as spelled out by Jesus of Nazereth. The Golden Rule, he said, was still rooted in solipsism -- everything is judged according to your own limited desires and needs, but the Catagorical Imperitive requires you to step back from your own Id, and look at the world as a whole, and act according to the benefit of others.

Many years later, I came across the Second Formulation, and I really like the way that is worded:

"Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means to an end"

And I also really like this passage from The Vatican Sayings, a 14th C manuscript collecting 80 maxims from Epicurus, and later philosophers of the Epicurean School:

While we are on the road, we must try to make what is before us better than what is past; when we come to the road's end, we feel a smooth contentment.