quotations about temptation
An untempted soul may be innocent, but cannot be virtuous, for virtue is the choice of right when wrong presses itself upon us and demands our choosing.
LYMAN ABBOTT
The Theology of an Evolutionist
The Devil's subtlest temptations are the ones you yield to without even knowing you've given in.
GLEN DUNCAN
Talulla Rising
None are known to be good, till they have opportunity to be bad.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
There are those who say that temptation can be barricaded beyond the door. The ones who think that stray desires can be driven out of the heart like the moneychangers from the temple. Maybe they can, if you patrol your weak points day and night, don't look, don't smell, don't dream.
JEANETTE WINTERSON
Written on the Body
Many people genuinely do not wish to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human beings. If one could follow it to its psychological roots, one would, I believe, find that the main motive for "non-attachment" is a desire to escape from the pain of living, and above all from love, which, sexual or non-sexual, is hard work.
GEORGE ORWELL
Reflections on Gandhi
Get thee behind me, Satan.
BIBLE
Matthew 16:23
So you tell yourself you are pretty fine clay
To have tricked temptation and turned it away,
But wait, my friend, for a different day;
Wait till you want to want to!
EDMUND VANCE COOKE
Desire
Temptation hath a music for all ears.
NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS
"Extract"
When you flee temptation be sure you don't leave a forwarding address.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
Too little temptation can lead to virtue.
KEN ALSTAD
Savvy Sayin's
Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour.... If at my convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?
CHARLOTTE BRONTË
Jane Eyre
The man who loves and seeks the excitement of temptation, shows that he is restrained from sin by fear, and not by principle--that while his life is on the side of virtue, his affections lean to vice.
JOSIAH GILBERT HOLLAND
Gold-foil, Hammered from Popular Proverbs
Often take counsel when tempted; and do not be harsh with others who are tempted, but console them as you yourself would wish to be consoled.
THOMAS A KEMPIS
The Imitation of Christ
There's a lesson in every temptation.
FRANK HERBERT
God Emperor of Dune
Lead me not into temptation; I can find the way myself.
RITA MAE BROWN
attributed, Wisdom for the Soul: Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing
Devils soonest tempt, resembling spirits of light.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Love's Labour's Lost
Bearing up against temptations and prevailing over them, is the very thing wherein the whole life of religion consists; 'Tis the trial which God puts upon us in this world, by which we are to make evidence of our love and obedience to Him, and of our fitness to be made members of His kingdom.
SAMUEL CLARKE
attributed, Works, Containing Sermons on Several Subjects, Volume 2
The devil and temptations also afford us occasion to learn and understand the Scriptures, by experience and practice. Without these we should never understand them, however diligently we read and listened to them.
MARTIN LUTHER
"Of God's Word", Table Talk