quotations about sin
It is good for a man to repent of his sins; but better for him had he never sinned.
WILLIAM SCOTT DOWNEY
Proverbs
The worst of evil befalling sinners is not an infliction from without, but arises out of the guilt of conscience within.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
Many people keep their old sins warm while they go to try on virtue and see if they like it.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
If it were not for sin, we should converse together as angels do.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
OSCAR WILDE
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Sometimes the sins you haven't committed are all you have to hold on to. If you're really desperate, you might need to grope, saying, for example, "I've never killed anyone with a hammer" or "I've never stolen from anyone who didn't deserve it."
DAVID SEDARIS
When You Are Engulfed in Flames
Our sins are like a carousel where the same decorated dogs, pigs, and goats, ridden by the foolish, come around again and again until the machine wears out.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
7 deadly sins
So many rules to bend
Time and time again
7 deadly sins
TRAVELING WILBURYS
"7 Deadly Sins"
Repentance is remedial work to mend our minds and hearts, which get bent by sin.
JOHN ORTBERG, JR.
The Me I Want to Be
Often in the hearts of sinners there is a deep love of goodness, fostered by the experience of sin. It may persist while the sinner goes on sinning. Through sinning it may grow stronger and achieve a wonderful humility. Haven't you noticed how genuinely attractive sinners often are? When they are frank in their sinning, free from pretense, they are nearly always likable. It is when they are hypocritical or brazen that they repel. To such fall none of the perquisites of sin. It is notorious that many people considered good by others and by themselves are the severest judges of their fellow-creatures, the most ready to condemn. There are good women who in their moral judgments achieve an almost inhuman cruelty. On the other hand, there are sinners who, through sinning, have reached a Christ-like patience with others, expressing itself in the kind of sympathy that can come only from perfect understanding, from the power to feel with other sinners. For they know that the state of sinning is not joyous but sad, that it is not to be condemned but to be pitied. And this knowledge flowers into qualities that in people about them cause amazement and mystification. These qualities are rare perquisites.
JOHN DANIEL BARRY
"Perquisites of Sin", Intimations
I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints
The sinners are much more fun
You know that only the good die young
BILLY JOEL
"Only the Good Die Young"
O sin, how you paint your face! How you flatter us poor mortals on to death! You never appear to the sinner in your true character; you make fair promises, but you never fulfil one; your tongue is smoother than oil, but the poison of asps is under your lip!
HOSEA BALLOU
Treasury of Thought
Lay siege to your sins, and starve them out by keeping away the food and fuel which is their maintenance and life.
RICHARD BAXTER
The Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter
Accepting the reality of our sinfulness means accepting our authentic self. Judas could not face his shadow; Peter could. The latter befriended the impostor within; the former raged against him.
BRENNAN MANNING
Abba's Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging
It is difficult for any soul to sin very outrageously so long as she feels the pressure of Christ's hand in hers.
ROBERT HUGH BENSON
The Friendship of Christ
Though our sins, our hearts confounding,
Long and loud for vengeance call,
Thou hast mercy more abounding,
Jesus' blood can cleanse them all.
EDWARD HENRY BICKERSTETH
"Dread Jehova, God of Nations"
What do you do when that sin is a part of who you are?
DANIELLE HILBORN
"Hate the sinner", Daily Californian, September 1, 2017
O SIN, thou only evil in which there is no good, thou guperfluity of naughtiness, thou quintessence of what is odious and execrable, whose nature is entirely opposite to that of God, and the reverse of his holy law, who claimest the devil for thy sire, while death, and hell, and misery, confess thee for their only parent! how hast thou troubled all the creation! upon what creatures hast thou not transmitted thy baleful influence!
WILLIAM MCEWEN
"On the Great Evil of Sin", Select Essays, Doctrinal & Practical on a Variety of the Most Important and Interesting Subjects in Divinity
Look on Sin and loathe it;
With minds loathing it,
Then will ye make
An end of Misery.
GAUTAMA BUDDHA
Iti-Vuttaka
It is the sinners who know from experience that sin is slavery. And they know that in sin there is no peace and that in the gratification of sin there is disappointment and disillusion. All these things the good people know from hearsay. Many of these people don't really believe the reports. They are among the most abject of the earth. They look out on the sins of the world and they long to sin and they are prevented from sinning, not because they love goodness, but because they are afraid. They are not afraid of evil. Far from it. In their hearts they love evil. They are afraid of certain consequences of evil, of punishment not directly related to the nature of evil, but forced into association with evil by public opinion. One of the perquisites of sin is that it teaches sinners the nature of evil. And by such teaching it reveals the beauty of goodness.
JOHN DANIEL BARRY
"Perquisites of Sin", Intimations