A Quote by T. S. Eliot

The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the right deed for the wrong reason.

T. S. Eliot

Quote Topics

Deed Greatest Last Reason Right Temptation Treason Wrong

Quote Author

T. S. Eliot
American - Poet
September 26, 1888 - January 4, 1965

No baseness or cruelty of treason so deep or so tragic shall enter our human world, but that loyal love shall be able in due time to oppose to just that deed of treason its fitting deed of atonement.

Josiah Royce

The noonday devil of the Christian life is the temptation to lose the inner self while preserving the shell of edifying behavior. Suddenly I discover that I am ministering to AIDS victims to enhance my resume. I find I renounced ice cream for Lent to lose five excess pounds... I have fallen victim to what T.S. Eliot calls the greatest sin: to do the right thing for the wrong reason.

Brennan Manning

The world, as transformed by this creative deed, is better than it would have been had all else remained the same, but had that deed of treason not been done at all.

Josiah Royce

Treason doth never prosper. What's the reason? Why, when it prospers, none dare call it treason.

John Harington

There can be as many wrong reasons to do the right thing as there are stars in the sky. There might even be more than one legitimate right reason. But there is never a right reason to do the wrong thing. Not ever.

Donita K. Paul

I have one reason why you should walk away from that temptation right now. One reason: God. Is. Better.

Francis Chan

I was born with the wrong sign In the wrong house With the wrong ascendancy I took the wrong road That led to The wrong tendencies I was in the wrong place At the wrong time For the wrong reason And the wrong rhyme On the wrong day Of the wrong week Used the wrong method With the wrong technique Wrong Wrong.

Martin Gore

Remember, remember the fifth of November of gunpowder treason and plot. I know of no reason why the gun powder treason should ever be forgot.

Alan Moore

Treason doth never prosper, what's the reason? For if it prosper, none dare call it Treason.

John Harington

Hardy's either done the wrong thing for the wrong reason . . . " Another big swallow. "Or the wrong thing for the right reason.

Lisa Kleypas

If you begin to have a relationship where you're doing what the guards want, and once you're out you will see that as a treason, a treason to your country, a treason to yourself, a treason to everybody, so you have to be very cautious on what is the perspective you're looking at yourself, and you have always to see yourself like from the outside.