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Temptation is that feeling of attraction to something which looks appealing to an individual.
- Why comes temptation but for man to meet
And master and make crouch beneath his foot,
And so be pedestaled in triumph?- Robert Browning, The Ring and the Book (1868-69), The Pope, line 1,185.
- I may not here omit those two main plagues, and common dotages of human kind, wine and women, which have infatuated and besotted myriads of people: they go commonly together.
- Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), Part I, Section II. Memb. 3. Subsect, XIII.
- Our founders were insightful students of human nature. They feared the abuse of power because they understood that every human being has not only "better angels" in his nature, but also an innate vulnerability to temptation — especially the temptation to abuse power over others.
- Al Gore, Address at New York University (25 May 2004) Full text online.
- It must not be supposed, however, that because we said that by the righteous decision of God each man is tempted in proportion to the degree of his strength, the tempted man ought therefore by all means to be victorious; for the competitor in the games cannot by all means be victorious, even though he may be paired with his opponent in an equal match. But unless the powers of the combatants are equal, the victor's palm will not be justly won nor may the vanquished be justly blamed. For this reason God allows us to be tempted, yet nor "above that we are able"; for we are tempted in proportion to our powers. Nor is it written that in temptation God will also make a way to escape from bearing it, but a way to escape that we may be able to bear it. And this possibility that he has given us is in our hands to utilize either vigorously or feebly. p. 281
- Origen, On First Principles, Chapter II, The Opposing Powers) based on G. W. Butterworth’s 1936 English translation, Christian Classics, Notre Dame, (1980) [Full text]
- This strength, therefore, which is given to us in order that we may be able to conquer, we by the exercise of our free will either use diligently and conquer or feebly and suffer defeat. For if it were given to us in such completeness as to ensure our victory by all means, that is, to prevent us from being by any possibility conquered, what reason for struggling would remain to him who could not be conquered? p. 282
- Origen, On First Principles based on G. W. Butterworth’s 1936 English translation, Christian Classics, Notre Dame, (1980)
- Moreover the book of the Shepherd asserts the teaching that two angels attend each human being, and saying that whenever good thoughts arise in our heart they are suggested by they good angel, and whenever thoughts of the opposite kind they are the inspiration of the bad angel. p.283
- Origen, On First Principles based on G. W. Butterworth’s 1936 English translation, Christian Classics, Notre Dame, (1980)
- We must bear in mind, however, that nothing else happens to us as a result of these good or evil thoughts which are suggested to our heart but a mere agitation and excitement which urges us on to deeds either of good or of evil. It is possible for us, when an evil power has begun to urge us on to a deed of evil, to cast away the wicked suggestions and to resist the low enticements and to do absolutely nothing worthy of blame; and it is possible on the other hand when a divine power has urged us on to better things not to follow its guidance, since our faculty of free will is preserved to us in either case. p.283-284
- Origen, On First Principles based on G. W. Butterworth’s 1936 English translation, Christian Classics, Notre Dame, (1980)
- But Satan now is wiser than of yore,
And tempts by making rich, not making poor.- Alexander Pope, Moral Essays (1731-35), Epistle III, line 351.
- Bell, book and candle shall not drive me back,
When gold and silver becks me to come on.- William Shakespeare, King John (1598), Act III, scene 3, line 12.
- How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds
Makes ill deeds done!- William Shakespeare, King John (1598), Act IV, scene 2, line 219.
- Devils soonest tempt, resembling spirits of light.
- William Shakespeare, Love's Labour's Lost (c. 1595-6), Act IV, scene 3, line 257.
- The suprahuman temptation will pile up over a person; like the sheep mountain that makes the hiker despair, so the suprahuman temptation will frighten the sufferer, transform him into a creeping thing in comparison with the size of the temptation. Just as a force of nature mocks human effort, so suprahuman temptation, haughtily swaggering, will be proud, like mockery at the poor sufferer. But, God be praised, there is no suprahuman temptation; there is only a mendacious fable invented by a pusillanimous or a crafty person who wants to shove guilt away from himself, to minimize his guilt by magnifying the temptation, to justifying himself by making it suprahuman. Scripture says the very opposite; it not only says that there is no suprahuman temptation, but in another place where it is speaking of the horror of which the anticipation would make people faint, it says to the believers, “When this happens, raise your heads.” (1 Cor 10.13, Luke 21.28)
- Soren Kierkegaard Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, Hong p. 302-303 (1847)
- I am that way going to temptation,
Where prayers cross.- William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure (1603), Act II, scene 2, line 158.
- Most dangerous
Is that temptation that doth goad us on
To sin in loving virtue.- William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure (1603), Act II, scene 2, line 181.
- To beguile many and be beguil'd by one.
- William Shakespeare, Othello (c. 1603), Act IV, scene 1, line 98.
- Know'st thou not any whom corrupting gold
Would tempt unto a close exploit of death?- William Shakespeare, Richard III (c. 1591), Act IV, scene 2, line 34.
- Sometimes we are devils to ourselves,
When we will tempt the frailty of our powers,
Presuming on their changeful potency.- William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida (c. 1602), Act IV, scene 4, line 97.
- With that power I should have power too great and terrible. And over me the Ring would gain a power still greater and more deadly....Do not tempt me! For I do not wish to become like the Dark Lord himself. Yet the way of the Ring to my heart is by pity, pity for weakness and the desire of strength to do good. Do not tempt me! I dare not take it, not even to keep it safe, unused. The wish to wield it would be too great for my strength. I shall have such need of it. Great perils lie before me.
- Gandalf, The Fellowship of the Ring, J.R.R. Tolkien, Pg. 135.
- I can resist everything except temptation.
- Oscar Wilde , Lady Windermere's Fan (1892), Act I
Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations
- Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 784-85.
- What's done we partly may compute,
But know not what's resisted.- Robert Burns, Address to Unco Guid, Stanza 8.
- 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.
- The devil tempts us not—'tis we tempt him,
Reckoning his skill with opportunity.- George Eliot, Felix Holt, Chapter XLVII.
- Entbehren sollst du! sollst entbehren.
- Thou shalt abstain,
Renounce, refrain. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, I. 4.
- Thou shalt abstain,
- Many a dangerous temptation comes to us in fine gay colours, that are but skin-deep.
- Matthew Henry, Commentaries, Genesis, III.
- Temptations hurt not, though they have accesse;
Satan o'ercomes none but by willingnesse.- Robert Herrick, Hesperides (1648), Temptations.
- Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life.
- James. I. 12.
- Honest bread is very well—it's the butter that makes the temptation.
- Douglas Jerrold, The Catspaw.
- Get thee behind me, Satan.
- Matthew, XVI. 23.
- Let a man be but in earnest in praying against a temptation as the tempter is in pressing it, and he needs not proceed by a surer measure.
- Bishop Robert South, Volume VI, Sermon 10.
- Could'st thou boast, O child of weakness!
O'er the sons of wrong and strife,
Were their strong temptations planted
In thy path of life?- John Greenleaf Whittier, What the Voice Said.
Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)
- Quotes reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895).
- When you have overcome one temptation, you must he ready to enter the lists with another. As distrust, in some sense, is the mother of safety, so security is the gate of danger. A man had need to fear this most of all, that he fears not at all.
- Thomas Brooks, p. 532.
- Temptations, when we meet them at first, are as the lion that roared upon Samson; but if we overcome them, the next time we see them we shall find a nest of honey within them.
- John Bunyan, p. 577.
- On this earth all is temptation. Crosses tempt us by irritating our pride, and prosperity by flattering it. Our life is a continual combat, but one in which Jesus Christ fights for us. We must pass on unmoved, while temptations rage around us, as the traveler, overtaken by a storm, simply wraps his cloak more closely about him, and pushes on more vigorously toward his destined home.
- François Fénelon, p. 577.
- The realization of God's presence is the one sovereign remedy against temptation.
- François Fénelon, p. 577.
- When tempted, the shortest and surest way is to act like a little child at the breast; when we show it a frightful monster, it shrinks back and buries its face in its mother's bosom, that it may no longer behold it.
- François Fénelon, p. 578.
- Christian! thou knowest thou earriest gunpowder about thee. Desire them that carry fire to keep at a distance. It is a dangerous crisis, when a proud heart meets with flattering lips.
- John Flavel, p. 578.
- In the hour of my distress,
When temptations me oppress,
And when I my sins confess,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me.- Robert Herrick, p. 577.
- We often wonder that certain men and women are left by God to the commission of sins that shock us. We wonder how, under the temptation of a single hour, they fall from the very heights of virtue and of honor into sin and shame. The fact is that there are no such falls as these, or there are next to none. These men and women are those who have dallied with temptation — have exposed themselves to the influence of it, and have been weakened and corrupted by it.
- Josiah Gilbert Holland, p. 577.
- Occasions of adversity best discover how great virtue or strength each one hath. For occasions do not make a man frail, but they show what he is.
- Thomas à Kempis, p. 578.
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