Quotes About Temptation

Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. ... We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means—the only complete realist.

Why is it that any time we speak of temptation we always speak of temptation as something that inclines us to wrong. We have more temptations to become good than we do to become bad.

All temptations can be handled easily when we know how, because no temptation is a temptation at all unless we are entertaining it.

The Eyes are the organs of temptation, and the Ears are the organs of instruction.

Jesus has many lovers of His kingdom of heaven, but he has few bearers of His Cross. Many desire His consolation, but few desire His tribulation. He finds many comrades in eating and drinking, but He finds few hands who will be with Him in His abstinence and fastingBut those who love Jesus purely for Himself, and not for their own profit or convenience, bless Him as heartily in temptation and tribulation and in all other adversities as they do in time of consolation. And if He never sent them consolation, they would still bless and praise Him.

I have great admiration for power, a great terror of weakness, especially in my own sex, yet feel that my love is for those who overcome the mental and moral suffering and temptation through excess of tenderness rather than through excess of strength.

The ordeal of virtue is to resist all temptation to evil.

Temptation out of reach does you no good.

My temptation is emotional, and resisting will further my needed weight loss and strengthen my character. Furthermore, nothing tastes as good as thin feels.

C. S. Lewis observed that almost all crimes of Christian history have come about when religion is confused with politics. Politics, which always runs by the rules of ungrace, allures us to trade away grace for power, a temptation the church has often been unable to resist.

„I forgive you for stealing my shawl.“ She smiles as he laughs. And then she vanishes. A simple trick of distracting his attention long enough to slip out through the hall, despite the lingering temptation to stay.

It is fundamental that the great powers of Congress to conduct war and to regulate the Nation's foreign relations are subject to the constitutional requirements of due process. The imperative necessity for safeguarding these rights to procedural due process under the gravest of emergencies has existed throughout our constitutional history, for it is then, under the pressing exigencies of crisis, that there is the greatest temptation to dispense with fundamental constitutional guarantees which, it is feared, will inhibit governmental action.

Virtue, which breaks through opposition and all temptation can remove, most shines, and most is acceptable above.

For anyone who lives in the oak-and-maple area of New England, there is a perennial temptation to plunge into a purple sea of adjectives about October.

The film The Last Temptation of Christ, no matter what its defenders say, was a slap in the face to Christians everywhere.

The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the right deed for the wrong reason.

There are some people that we know all our lives and yet never really feel we know them at all. But there are other people—” Unable to resist the temptation, he ran a feather-light caress down the curve of her cheek with one leather-sheathed knuckle. The cobalt depths of her eyes flickered with response, but she said nothing, heeding his every word. “—people we meet in a day, and instantly, it feels as though we’ve known them all our lives.

In the quiet hours, in the heat of battle, and through the hazards of the day; in times of temptation, of sorrow, of peace and of blessing, let us pray always, both alone, and with our families gathered around us, with gratitude for the blessings of life, for understanding of its problems, and for strength to endure to the end.

There is a danger in our modern practice of using embedded journalism. As there is less and less money available for journalism to uphold its independence, there is a temptation for people to take short cuts. If this army or that army or this corporation is willing to pay for your flight or your accommodation, then it's much more difficult to tell what the real story might be. I do have a concern about that.

The reason why many fail in battle is because they wait until the hour of battle. The reason why others succeed is because they have gained their victory on their knees long before the battle came. Anticipate your battles; fight them on your knees before temptation comes, and you will always have victory.

With so much reading ahead of you, the temptation might be to speed up. But in fact it’s essential to slow down and read every word. Because one important thing that can be learned by reading slowly is the seemingly obvious but oddly underappreciated fact that language is the medium we use in much the same way a composer uses notes, the way a painter uses paint. I realize it may seem obvious, but it’s surprising how easily we lose sight of the fact that words are the raw material out of which literature is crafted.

Which is scarier-- lust or temptation?

The city is always influential in the work, though I've had that temptation to leave, but only recently. It's difficult because whenever I start working someplace else, I'm like, "Man, this would have been better if I had my subwoofer."

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful.

When you really put your heart and soul into something, the temptation is to try to be in control of circumstances, however you can, and looking and seeing how people are responding.

Our consumer-oriented economy wouldn't survive without economic growth. The whole mechanism depends on invention and insinuation of novelties, arousing new wants, seduction and temptation. This is the problem we face - much more than recapitalizing the banks. The question is: Is that kind of economy sustainable?

Ever notice that the whisper of temptation can be heard farther than the loudest call to duty.

Where faith is not continually kept in motion and exercised, it weakens and decreases, so that it must indeed vanish; and yet we do not see nor feel this weakness ourselves, except in times of need and temptation, when unbelief rages too strongly; and yet for that very reason faith must have temptations in which it may battle and grow.

The most common trait I have found in all successful people is that they have conquered the temptation to give up.

Prayer gives us strength for great ideals, for keeping up our faith, charity, purity, generosity; prayer gives us strength to rise up from indifference and guilt, if we have had the misfortune to give in to temptation and weakness. Prayer gives us light by which to see and to judge from God's perspective and from eternity. That is why you must not give up on praying!

Mixing with groups of people can be enjoyed, it is pleasing in a way that cannot be explained other than the temptation to become closer to one or the other.

Really? And what curse befalls the Adams of the world?" Ann opens her mouth and, presumably thinking of nothing to say, closes it again. It is Felicity who answers, eyes steely. "They are weak to temptation. And we are their temptresses.

There are in truth three states of the converted: the beginning, the middle, and the perfection. In the beginning they experience the charms of sweetness; in the middle the contests of temptation; and in the end the fullness of perfection.

As we touch the temple and love the temple, our lives will reflect our faith. As we go to the holy house, as we remember the covenants we make therein, we will be able to bear every trial and overcome each temptation.

The besetting evil of our age is the temptation to squander and dilute thought on a thousand different lines of inquiry.

This is the great work of a man: always to take the blame for his own sins before God, and toexpect temptation to his last breath.

Dreams have consequences. There is no turning back. A revolution is not a painless march to the gates of freedom and justice. It is a struggle between rage and hope, between the temptation to destroy and the desire to build. Its temperament is desperate. It is a tormented response to the past, to all that has happened, the recalled and unrecalled injustices - for the memory of a revolution reaches much further back than the memory of its protagonists.

The future is always present, as a promise, a lure and a temptation.

The Puritan, of course, is not entirely devoid of aesthetic feeling. He has a taste for good form; he responds to style; he is even capable of something approaching a purely aesthetic emotion. But he fears this aesthetic emotion as an insinuating distraction from his chief business in life: the sober consideration of the all-important problem of conduct. Art is a temptation, a seduction, a Lorelei, and the Good Man may safely have traffic with it when it is broken to moral uses--in other words, when its innocence is pumped out of it, and it is purged of gusto.

The temptation is for us to share our own opinions, our own thoughts and to speak from the whole realm of possibility. We can't do that as pastors. We need to have a strong voice of conviction, and the way we can do that is through Scripture.

Lawyer: one who protects us against robbery by taking away the temptation.

Character is distilled out of our daily confrontation with temptation, out of our regular response to the call of duty. It is formed as we learn to cherish principles and to submit to self-discipline. Character is the sum total of all the little decisions, the small deeds, the daily reactions to the choices that confront us. Character is not obtained instantly. We have to mold and hammer and forge ourselves into character. It is a distant goal to which there is no shortcut.

Lead me not into temptation; I can find the way myself.

Miss Prism: And you do not seem to realize, dear Doctor, that by persistently remaining single, a man converts himself into a permanent public temptation. Men should be more careful; this very celibacy leads weaker vessels astray. Chasuble: But is a man not equally attractive when married? Miss Prism: No married man is ever attractive except to his wife. Chasuble: And often, I've been told, not even to her.

Virtue is insufficient temptation.

It is a temptation to exploit one's technique because an audience is easily reached this way, but they cannot be moved by technique alone and to move an audience is the role of dance as an art.

Why comes temptation but for man to meet And master and make crouch beneath his foot, And so be pedestaled in triumph?

The work that leads to a doctor's degree is a constant temptation to sacrifice one's growth as a man to one's growth as a specialist.