Never be entirely idle; but either be reading, or writing, or praying or meditating or endeavoring something for the public good.
– Thomas a Kempis
Idleness | Meditation
The most likely man to go to hell is the man who has nothing to do on earth. Idle people tempt the devil to tempt them.
– Charles Spurgeon
Idleness
Idleness is a constant sin, and labor is a duty. Idleness is the devil’s home for temptation and for unprofitable, distracting musings; while labor profiteth others and ourselves.
– Richard Baxter
Idleness
Idleness among children, as among men, is the root of all evil, and leads to no other evil more certain than ill temper.
– Hannah More
Children | Idleness
A true faith in Jesus Christ will not suffer us to be idle. No, it is an active, lively, restless principle; it fills the heart, so that it cannot be easy till it is doing something for Jesus Christ.
– George Whitefield
Idleness
Certainly work is not always required of a man. There is such a thing as a sacred idleness-the cultivation of which is now fearfully neglected.
– George Macdonald
Idleness | WorkIdleness
One secret act of self-denial, one sacrifice of inclination to duty, is worth all the mere good thoughts, warm feelings, passionate prayers in which idle people indulge themselves.
– John Henry Newman
Service | Self-denial | Idleness
An idle life and a holy heart is a contradiction.
– Thomas Brooks
Idleness | The Heart
He is idle that might be better employed.
– Thomas Fuller
Idleness
Multifarious reading weakens the mind more than doing nothing, for it becomes a necessity, at last, like smoking: and is an excuse for the mind to lie dormant whilst thought is poured in, and runs through, a clear stream over unproductive gravel, on which not even mosses grow. It is the idlest of all idleness, and leaves more of impotency than any other.
– Frederick W. Robertson
Books | Reading | Idleness
The idle man is the devil’s cushion, on which he taketh his free ease, who, as he is incapable of any good, so he is fitly disposed for all evil motions.
– Joseph Hall
Idleness
Idleness tempts the devil to tempt.
– Thomas Watson
Idleness
So long as idleness is quite shut out from our lives, all the sins of wantonness, softness, and effeminacy are prevented; and there is but little room for temptation.
– Jeremy Taylor
Idleness | Temptation
It is not that doing nothing is of itself so wicked; it is the opportunity it affords to evil and empty thoughts; it is the wide door it opens for Satan to throw in the seeds of bad things; it is this which is mainly to be feared.
– J. C. Ryle
Idleness
In idleness there is a perpetual despair.
– Thomas Carlyle
Idleness
Idleness is the burial of a living man.
– Jeremy Taylor
Idleness
Idleness gives great advantage to the tempter. Standing waters gather filth.
– Matthew Henry
Idleness
Debt is the secret foe of thrift, as vice and idleness are its open enemies.
– James H. Aughey
Finances | Idleness
There is not a thing on the face of the earth that I abhor so much as idleness or idle people.
– George Whitefield
Idleness
Avoid idleness, and fill up all the spaces of thy time with severe and useful employment; for lust easily creeps in at those emptinesses where the soul is unemployed and the body is at ease; for no easy, healthful, idle person was ever chaste if he could be tempted; but of all employments, bodily labor is the most useful, and of the greatest benefit for driving away the Devil.
– Jeremy Taylor
Idleness | LustWork
It is impossible for any Christian who spends the bulk of his evenings, month after month, week upon week, day in and day out watching the major TV networks or contemporary videos to have a Christian mind. This is always true of all Christians in every situation! A Biblical mental program cannot coexist with worldly programming.
– R. Kent Hughes
Idleness | Worldliness
The devil visits idle men with his temptations. God visits industrious men with His favors.
– Matthew Henry
Idleness | Temptation
Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.
– Isaac Watts
Idleness | Satan
Idleness is the devil’s best friend. It is the surest way to give him an opportunity of doing us some harm. An idle mind is like an open door, and if Satan does not come through it himself, it is certain he will throw something in to arouse bad thoughts in us.
– J. C. Ryle
Idleness
I would neither have you be idle in duties – nor make an idol of duties.
– William Secker
Idleness | Idolatry
Let your sleep be necessary and healthful, not idle and expensive of time beyond the needs and conveniences of nature; and sometimes be curious to see the preparation the sun makes when he is coming forth from his chambers in the east.
– Jeremy Taylor
Life | Idleness
Don’t Just Do Something: Stand There. Don’t Just Stand There: Do Something.
– Albert Mohler
Idleness | Service