Temptation
’Tis one thing to be tempted,
Another thing to fall.
William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
An idle person tempts the devil to tempt him.
Proverb
Be not a baker if your head be of butter.
Spanish Proverb
Better shun the bait than struggle in the snare.
John Dryden (1631–1700)
Curiosity is a kernel of the forbidden fruit which still sticks in a man’s throat, sometimes to the danger of his choking.
Sir Thomas Fuller (1608–1661)
Do not bite at the bait of pleasure till you know there is no hook beneath it.
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
Each temptation leaves us better or worse; neutrality is impossible.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
Eve, with all the fruits of Eden blest,
Save only one, rather than leave that one unknown,
Lost all the rest.
Thomas Moore (1779–1852)
Feather by feather the goose is plucked.
John Ray (1627–1705)
Flee temptation and don’t leave a forwarding address.
For every great temptation there will be many small ones. Wolves and bears are more dangerous than flies, but we are bothered most by flies.
Saint Francis of Sales (1567–1622)
God delights in our temptations and yet hates them. He delights in them when they drive us to prayer; he hates them when they drive us to despair.
Martin Luther (1483–1546)
God does not make our choices easier because temptation is his character development curriculum.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
God is better served in resisting a temptation to evil than in many formal prayers.
William Penn (1644–1718)
God never tempts any man. That is Satan’s business.
Billy Graham (1918– )
God tested Abraham. Temptation is not meant to make us fail; it is meant to confront us with a situation out of which we emerge stronger than we were. Temptation is not the penalty of manhood; it is the glory of manhood.
William Barclay (1907–1978)
He must have iron nails that scratches a bear.
Russian Proverb
He that lies with dogs rises with fleas.
Proverb
He who feeds a wolf strengthens his enemy.
Danish Proverb
He who has no mind to trade with the devil should keep from his shop.
Robert South (1634–1716)
He who plays with the dust will get his eyes full of dust.
Arabian Proverb
He who wants to play with a cat should be able to bear its scratches.
Arabian Proverb
He who would not fall off the precipice must not venture too near the edge.
Frances J. Roberts
Her rash hand in evil hour
Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she eat:
Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat,
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe
That all was lost.
John Milton (1608–1674)
Honest bread is very well—it’s the butter that makes the temptation.
Douglas William Jerrold (1803–1857)
However big the whale may be, the tiny harpoon can rob him of his life.
Malay Proverb
If it takes temptation and sin to show God in his true colors and Satan in his, something has been saved from the wreck.
Michael Green (1930– )
It is easier to stay out than to get out.
Mark Twain (1835–1910)
It is much easier to repent of sins that we have committed than to repent of those we intend to commit.
Josh Billings (1818–1885)
My temptation has become my strength, for to the very fight with it I owe my force.
W. C. Gannett
My temptations have been my masters in divinity.
Martin Luther (1483–1546)
No matter how many pleasures Satan offers you, his ultimate intention is to ruin you. Your destruction is his highest priority.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
Oftentimes great and open temptations are the most harmless because they come with banners flying and bands playing and all the munitions of war in full view, so that we know we are in the midst of enemies that mean us damage, and we get ready to meet and resist them. Our peculiar dangers are those that surprise us and work treachery in our fort.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813–1887)
Our response to temptation is an accurate barometer of our love for God.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
People do not decide to be drunkards, drug addicts, prostitutes, murderers, or thieves, but they pitch their tent toward Sodom, and the powers of evil overcome them.
John H. Eastwood
Pheasants are fools if they invite the hawk to dinner.
Proverb
Satan tried to put Jesus Christ on the way to becoming King of the world and Savior of men in a way other than that predetermined by God.
Oswald Chambers (1874–1917)
Some people are tempted most strongly at the beginning of their spiritual life, others near the end. Some are troubled all their lives. Still others receive only light temptation. Such things are decided by God, and we can trust his wisdom.
Thomas à Kempis (c. 1380–1471)
Step not on the sleeping serpent.
Spanish Proverb
Straw should make no pact with fire.
Russian Proverb
Temptation is God’s magnifying glass; it shows us how much work he has left to do in our lives.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
Temptation is not a sin; it is a call to battle.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
Temptation is the devil looking through the keyhole; yielding is opening the door and inviting him in.
Billy Sunday (1862–1935)
Temptation provokes me to look upward to God.
John Bunyan (1628–1688)
Temptation: the fiend at my elbow.
William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
Temptations are like tramps. Treat them kindly, and they will return bringing others with them.
Temptations are never so dangerous as when they come to us in a religious garb.
Dwight Lyman Moody (1837–1899)
Temptations in the life of faith are not accidents; each temptation is part of a plan, a step in the progress of faith.
Oswald Chambers (1874–1917)
Temptations that find us leaning on God are to our faith like winds that more firmly root the tree.
Temptations, when we first meet them, 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 (1628–1688)
The devil tempts that he may ruin; God tests that he may crown.
Saint Ambrose (c. 340–397)
The greatest of all evils is not to be tempted because there are then grounds for believing that the devil looks upon us as his property.
Saint Jean Baptiste Marie Vianney (1786–1859)
The man who has never been tempted doesn’t know how dishonest he is.
Josh Billings (1818–1885)
The whole effort—the object of—temptation is to induce us to substitute something else for God. To obscure God.
R. H. Stewart
There are no faults in a thing we want badly.
Arabian Proverb
There is no evil that does not offer inducements. Vices tempt you by the rewards which they offer.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca (c. 4 b.c.–a.d. 65)
There is no way to kill a man’s righteousness but by his own consent.John Bunyan (1628–1688)
They said to a mouse, “There is a piece of cheese on the cat’s whiskers.” She replied, “Yes, the cheese is delicious, but the way to it is risky.”
Arabian Proverb
Things forbidden have a secret charm.
Cornelius Tacitus (c. 56–c. 120)
Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.
William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
Those saints which God loves best,
The devil tempts not least.
Robert Herrick (1591–1674)
Though this test be not thy choice,
It is his—therefore rejoice!
Hannah Hurnard (1905–1990)
To attempt to resist temptation, abandon bad habits, and control passion in our own strength, is like attempting to check by a spider’s thread the progress of a ship.
Benjamin Waugh (1839–1908)
Unless there is within us that which is above us, we shall soon yield to that which is about us.
P. T. Forsyth (1848–1921)
We are no more responsible for the evil thoughts that pass through our minds than a scarecrow for the birds which fly over the seedplot he has to guard. The sole responsibility in each case is to prevent them from settling.
John Churton Collins (1848–1908)
We cannot say no to temptation without saying yes to something far better.
Erwin W. Lutzer (1941– )
We have all a propensity to grasp at forbidden fruit.
Latin Proverb
When Eve upon the first of men
The apple pressed, with specious cant,
Oh! what a thousand pities then
That Adam was not Adamant!
Thomas Hood (1799–1845)
When in doubt, go home.
When the spider would attack thee, it extends its web to entangle thee.
African Proverb
When we do ill, the devil tempts us; when we do nothing, we tempt him.
Sir Thomas Fuller (1608–1661)
When you fly from temptation, don’t leave a forwarding address.
Where there’s smoke there’s fire.
Plautus (c. 254–184 b.c.)
While I see many hoofmarks going in, I see none coming out. It is easier to get into the enemy’s toils than out again.
Aesop (fl. c. 550 b.c.)
Who hangs himself in the chimney should not complain of smoke.
German Proverb
Who rides a tiger cannot dismount.
Chinese Proverb
Why comes temptation, but for man to meet
And master and make crouch beneath his foot,
And so be pedestaled in triumph?
Robert Browning (1812–1889)
