quotations about evil
How many things are now called the worst evil, which are only twelve feet wide and three months long! But some day greater dragons will come into the world.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Thus Spoke Zarathustra
I believe that there is one story in the world, and only one. . . . Humans are caught--in their lives, in their thoughts, in their hungers and ambitions, in their avarice and cruelty, and in their kindness and generosity too--in a net of good and evil. . . . There is no other story. A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean questions: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well--or ill?
JOHN STEINBECK
East of Eden
Very few people see their own actions as truly evil.... It is left to their victims to decide what is evil and what is not.
LAURELL K. HAMILTON
Blue Moon
Evil comes up softly like a flower.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE
"Epilogue"
No man is compelled to evil; his consent only makes it his.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
Never open the door to a lesser evil, for other and greater ones invariably slink in after it.
BALTASAR GRACIAN
The Art of Worldly Wisdom
Is the Deity able to prevent evil, but not willing, where is his benevolence; is he willing, but not able, where is his power; is he both able and willing, whence then is evil?
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Evil comes and evil goes.
MY LIFE WITH THE THRILL KILL KULT & BOMB GANG GIRLS
"Mr. & Mrs. Bottomless Pit", Crime for All Seasons
I desire to go through life knowing as little of evil in it as possible. To this end, I sometimes avoid looking too closely into the nature of things, studying them only so far as they seem to be good, and abandoning interest in them as soon as their darker feature begin to appear. The good only deserves a hearty interest.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
All men begin as good men. What they are taught as children, what is expected of them as young men, is either the armor about that goodness or the flaw that allows evil in.
DAVID WEBER
Off Armageddon Reef
Wickedness goes to great lengths and depths where it is not checked and restrained by the free and continuous expression of the indignation of good men.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
All I ask of Fate is that the people she hurls into my life, whether they are evil or good, or morally bipolar, should be amusing to one degree or another.... The problem is finding smile-inducing evil people, because the evil are the most humorless, though in the movies they frequently get some of the best lines.
DEAN KOONTZ
Brother Odd
The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.
HANNAH ARENDT
"Thinking", The Life of the Mind
Apathy and evil. The two work hand in hand. They are the same, really.... Evil wills it. Apathy allows it. Evil hates the innocent and the defenseless most of all. Apathy doesn't care as long as it's not personally inconvenienced.
JAKE THOENE
Shaiton's Fire
Length of days with an evil heart is only length of misery.
C. S. LEWIS
The Magician's Nephew
Here there's no possibility of doing evil. You live in evil. In the absence of remorse. How could you do evil?
JEAN GENET
The Balcony
Evil endures a moment's flush, and then--leaves but a burnt out shell.
ELISE PUMPELLY CABOT
"Arizona"
The idea ... that collective society should take hold of Evil and set it down hard in its chair and make it cry seems to many of us absolutely sound. Of course, we feel that it is not for us, those who love righteousness, to jump on the necks of the wicked. We prefer to have it attended to in a more dignified, impersonal way by Society as a whole.
GERALD STANLEY LEE
Crowds
Evil is relative.... You can’t hang a sign on it. You can’t touch it or taste it or cut it with a sword. Evil depends on where you are standing, pointing your indicting finger.
GLEN COOK
The Black Company
Fairly examined, truly understood,
No man is wholly bad, nor wholly good.
THEOGNIS OF MEGARA
Fragment XLI