| | |

sin quotes

English (46) Français (22)

edits filters

“Sin from thy lips? O trespass sweetly urged! Give me my sin again.” William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
“Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul.” Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita
“All that alcohol does for them is to liberate the sense of sin, which reason suppresses in saner moments .” Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness
“Now in matters of action the reason directs all things in view of the end: wherefore the higher the end which attaches to sins in human acts, the graver the sin.” Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
“The theologian considers sin chiefly as an offense against God; and the moral philosopher, as something contrary to reason.” Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
“this is one of the most decisive definitions for all Christianity—that the opposite of sin is not virtue but faith.” Søren Kierkegaard, The Sickness Unto Death
“Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.” Mark Twain, Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Anything that's mended is but patched; virtue that transgresses is but patched with sin, and sin that amends is but patched with virtue.” William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
“To play the demagogue for purposes of self-interest is a cardinal sin against the people in a democracy, exactly as to play the courtier for such purposes is a cardinal sin against the people under other forms of government.” Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt; an Autobiography
“But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.” Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
“The most unpardonable sin in society is independence of thought.” Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays
“The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.” Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance
“Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition: By that sin fell the angels. How can man then, the image of his Maker, hope to win by it?” William Shakespeare, Henry VIII
“Did perpetual happiness in the Garden of Eden maybe get so boring that eating the apple was justified?” Chuck Palahniuk, Survivor
“Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all.” William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2
“Some tourists think Amsterdam is a city of sin, but in truth it is a city of freedom. And in freedom, most people find sin.” John Green, The Fault in Our Stars
“People to whom sin is just a matter of words, to them salvation is just words too.” William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying
“Grace remits sin, and peace quiets the conscience. Sin and conscience torment us, but Christ has overcome these fiends now and forever.” Martin Luther, Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians
“Sin is an exacting despot who can be vanquished by no created power, but by the sovereign power of Jesus Christ alone.” Martin Luther, Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians
“If I am the chief of sinners, I am the chief of sufferers also.” Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
“There are only two kinds of men: the righteous who believe themselves sinners; the rest, sinners, who believe themselves righteous.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées
“Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts” C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
“Believe that God loves you as you cannot conceive; that He loves you with your sin, in your sin.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
“Besides, nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.” Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table
“'How do you take your coffee?' 'Dark as night, sweet as sin.'” Neil Gaiman, Anansi Boys
“But if it be a sin to covet honour, I am the most offending soul alive.” William Shakespeare, Henry V
“All sinners would be miserable in heaven.” Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
“Further, nothing, except sin, is contrary to an act of virtue. But war is contrary to peace. Therefore war is always a sin.” Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica
“It is silly not to hope . . . Besides I believe it is a sin.” Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea
“To kill, I grant, is sin's extremest gust; but, in defence, by mercy, 'tis most just.” William Shakespeare, Timon of Athens
“There will be more joy in heaven over the tear-bathed face of a repentant sinner than over the white robes of a hundred just men.” Victor Hugo, Les Misérables
“Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy.” William Shakespeare, Timon of Athens
“Jean Valjean, my brother, you no longer belong to evil, but to good. It is your soul that I buy from you; I withdraw it from black thoughts and the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God.” Victor Hugo, Les Misérables
“In this world, shipmates, sin that pays its way can travel freely, and without a passport; whereas Virtue, if a pauper, is stopped at all frontiers.” Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
“The monks used to say that he was more drawn to those who were more sinful, and the greater the sinner the more he loved him.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
“No evil dooms us hopelessly except the evil we love, and desire to continue in, and make no effort to escape from.” George Eliot, Daniel Deronda
“Love covers a multitude of sins, and of whom could you ask more freely than of him?” Louisa May Alcott, Little Women
“Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. It cannot be concealed.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“magic! I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell truth, I tell what ought to be truth. And if that is sinful, then let me be damned for it!” Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire
“How heavy is the toll of sins and wrongs that wealth, power and prestige exact from man!” Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of my Experiments with Truth
“It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also.” Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
“Whatever her sins, they were not sins of intention, but of inadvertence, and why should she have been punished so persistently?” Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles
“There ain’t no sin and there ain’t no virtue. There’s just stuff people do.” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
“There is no sin except stupidity.” Oscar Wilde, Intentions

Related topics

virtue love reason God freedom power evil belief conscience faith happiness truth courage future humanity past change words passion desire

Related authors

William Shakespeare (7)
Oscar Wilde (6)
Thomas Aquinas (3)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (2)
Victor Hugo (2)
Martin Luther (2)
Aldous Huxley (1)
Mark Twain (1)
Bertrand Russell (1)
Chuck Palahniuk (1)
John Steinbeck (1)
C. S. Lewis (1)
Neil Gaiman (1)
Blaise Pascal (1)
Mahatma Gandhi (1)
George Eliot (1)
Ernest Hemingway (1)
Louisa May Alcott (1)
John Green (1)
Theodore Roosevelt (1)

Related sources

The Picture of Dorian Gray (4)
Summa Theologica (3)
The Brothers Karamazov (2)
Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (2)
Timon of Athens (2)
Les Misérables (2)
Lolita (1)
Romeo and Juliet (1)
A Woman of No Importance (1)
Intentions (1)
Brave New World (1)
Little Women (1)
Twelfth Night (1)
The Conquest of Happiness (1)
Moby-Dick (1)
The Story of my Experiments with Truth (1)
The Fault in Our Stars (1)
The Old Man and the Sea (1)
Wuthering Heights (1)
Anarchism and Other Essays (1)