I hear you reproach, 'But delay was best, For their end was a crime.' Oh, a crime will do As well, I reply, to serve for a test As a virtue golden through and through, Sufficient to vindicate itself And prove its worth at a moment's view ...... Let a man contend to the uttermost For his life's set prize, be it what it will The counter our lovers staked was lost As surely as if it were lawful coin And the sin I impute to each frustrate ghost Isthe unlit lamp and the ungirt loin, Though the end in sight was a vice, I say. (Robert Browning)

I hear you reproach, 'But delay was best, For their end was a crime.' Oh, a crime will do As well, I reply, to serve for a test As a virtue golden through and through, Sufficient to vindicate itself And prove its worth at a moment's view ...... Let a man contend to the uttermost For his life's set prize, be it what it will The counter our lovers staked was lost As surely as if it were lawful coin And the sin I impute to each frustrate ghost Isthe unlit lamp and the ungirt loin, Though the end in sight was a vice, I say.

Robert Browning

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Gregory of Nazianzus

The Lord greatly loves the repenting sinner and mercifully presses him to His bosom: "Where were you, My child? I was waiting a long time for you." The Lord calles all to Himself with the voice of the Gospel, and his voice is heard in all the world: "Come to me, my sheep. I created you, and I love you. My love for you brought Me to earth, and I suffered all things for the sake of your salvation, and I want you all to know my love, and to say, like the apostles on Tabor: Lord, it is good for us to be with You."

Silouan the Athonite

Explain it,” Hamilton muttered. "This place-this bar. Why doesn't God erase it? If this world operates by moral laws-” "This bar is necessary to the moral order. This is a sinkpit of corruption and vice, a fleshpot of iniquity. You think salvation can function without damnation? You think virtue can exist without sin? That's the trouble with you atheists; you don't grasp the mechanics of evil. Get on the inside and enjoy life, man. If you're one of the Faithful, you've got nothing to worry about.” "Opportunist.

Philip K. Dick

I had allowed myself to be deceived into unknowingly passing along a falsehood. It would ultimately prove fatal to my ability to serve the President effectively. I didn't learn that what I'd said was untrue until the media began to figure it out almost two years later. ... Neither, I believe, did President Bush. he too had been deceived, and therefore became unwittingly involved in deceiving me. But the top White House officials who know the truth -- including Rove, Libby, and possibly Vice President Cheney -- allowed me, even encouraged me, to repeat a lie.

Scott McClellan

It is an advantage to all narrow wisdom and narrow morals that their maxims have a plausible air; and, on a cursory view, appear equal to first principles. They are light and portable. They are as current as copper coin; and about as valuable. They serve equally the first capacities and the lowest; and they are, at least, as useful to the worst men as to the best. Of this stamp is the cant of not man, but measures; a sort of charm by which many people get loose from every honourable engagement.

Edmund Burke