Tryon Edwards Quotes

Sinful and forbidden pleasures are like poisoned bread; they may satisfy appetite for the moment, but there is death in them at the end.

Anecdotes are sometimes the best vehicles of truth, and if striking and appropriate are often more impressive and powerful than argument.

Any act often repeated soon forms a habit; and habit allowed, steady gains in strength, At first it may be but as a spider's web, easily broken through, but if not resisted it soon binds us with chains of steel.

The first step to improvement, whether mental, moral, or religious, is to know ourselves - our weakness, errors, deficiencies, and sins, that, by divine grace, we may overcome and turn from them all.

Compromise is but the sacrifice of one right or good in the hope of retaining another - too often ending in the loss of both.

Most controversies would soon be ended, if those engaged in them would first accurately define their terms, and then adhere to their definitions.

To murder character is as truly a crime as to murder the body: the tongue of the slanderer is brother to the dagger of the assassin

He that never changes his opinion never corrects mistakes and will never be wiser on the morrow than he is today.

Credulity is belief in slight evidence, with no evidence, or against evidence.

Whoever in prayer can say, 'Our Father', acknowledges and should feel the brotherhood of the whole race of mankind.

We should be as careful of the books we read, as of the company we keep. The dead very often have more power than the living.

The secret of a good memory is attention, and attention to a subject depends upon our interest in it. We rarely forget that which has made a deep impression on our minds.

Between two evils, choose neither; between two goods, choose both.

The great end of education is to discipline rather than to furnish the mind; to train it to the use of its own powers, rather than fill it with the accumulation of others.

People never improve unless they look to some standard or example higher or better than themselves.

Accuracy of statement is one of the first elements of truth; inaccuracy is a near kin to falsehood.

Sin with the multitude, and your responsibility and guilt are as great and as truly personal, as if you alone had done the wrong

To rejoice in another's prosperity is to give content to your lot; to mitigate another's grief is to alleviate or dispel your own

Facts are God's arguments; we should be careful never to misunderstand or pervert them.

He who can suppress a moments anger may prevent a day of sorrow.

Hell is truth seen too lateduty neglected in its season.

We never reach our ideals, whether of mental or moral improvement, but the thought of them shows us our deficiencies, and spurs us on to higher and better things.

To waken interest and kindle enthusiasm is the sure way to teach easily and successfully.

Happiness is like manna; it is to be gathered in grains, and enjoyed every day. It will not keep; it cannot be accumulated; nor have we got to go out of ourselves or into remote places to gather it, since it has rained down from a Heaven, at our very door.

To be good, we must do good; and by doing good we take a sure means of being good, as the use and exercise of the muscles increase their power.

Anxiety is the poison of human life; the parent of many sins and of more miseries. In a world where everything is doubtful, and where we may be disappointed, and be blessed in disappointment, why this restless stir and commotion of mind? Can it alter the cause, or unravel the mystery of human events?

He that is possessed with a prejudice is possessed with a devil, and one of the worst kinds of devils, for it shuts out the truth, and often leads to ruinous error.

What we gave, we have; What we spent, we had; What we left, we lost.