Hosea Ballou Quotes

Like sin itself, Satan appeals to the senses. He originated and perfected the art of disguising evil as good.

The more sin is rationalized, the greater the possibility of destruction by Satan's wolves.

Man has fallen victim to seduction since times immemorial.

The devil, that old stager, who leads downward, perhaps, but fiddles all the way!

When Satan cannot get a great sin in he will let a little one in, like the thief who goes and finds shutters all coated with iron and bolted inside. At last he sees a little window in a chamber. He cannot get in, so he puts a little boy in, that he may go round and open the back door. So the devil has always his little sins to carry about with him to go and open back doors for him, and we let one in and say, 'O, it is only a little one.' Yes, but how that little one becomes the ruin of the entire man!

You carry your snare everywhere and spread your nets in all places. You allege that you never invited others to sin. You did not indeed, by your words, but you have done so by your dress and your deportment.

Open is the way of Satan; many walk therein.

The devil's voice is sweet to hear.

Both mind and heart when given up to reveries and dreaminess, have a thousand avenues open for the entrance of evil.

Destroy the seed of evil, or it will grow up to your ruin.

To see and listen to the wicked is already the beginning of wickedness.

Evil changes everybody!

False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.

When a man gets his money in bad ways, when he sees the better course and takes the worse, then the devil's in his heart, and that fixes him.

The better day, the worse deed.

Pleasure has ever more been represented by poets and by painters as clothed in perpetual smiles and adorned with the richest jewels; and in real life, we have known many who, allured by her deceptions, blandishments, and hollow but showy temptations, have followed as she pointed until ruin has befallen them.

Sin may result from activities that begin innocently or that are perfectly legitimate in moderation, but in excess they can cause us to veer from the straight and narrow path to our destruction.

I feel like every time you think you really understand how deep the seductive power of evil is, it always proves to be one step deeper than you thought possible.

Make yourself honey and the flies will devour you.

Other sins find their vent in the accomplishment of evil deeds, whereas pride lies in wait for good deeds, to destroy them.

The bee that hath honey in her mouth hath a sting in her tail.

I could not resist the temptation of mystifying him a bit, I suppose it is some taste of the original apple that remains still in our mouths.

He that will play with Satan's bait, will quickly be taken with Satan's hook.

Avalanches of evil begin with a single pebble of sin.

The media have, indeed, provided the Devil with perhaps the greatest opportunity accorded him since Adam and Eve were turned out of the Garden of Eden.