Sin is a base and ill-natured thing, and renders a man not so apt to be affected with the injuries he hath offered to God as with the mischief which is likely to fall upon himself.
John Tillotson (1630–1694) English prelate, Archbishop of Canterbury
(Attributed)
Quotations by:
Tillotson, John
But insincerity is very troublesome to manage; a man hath so many things to attend to, so many ends to bring together, as make his life a very perplexed and intricate thing. Oportet mendacem esse memorem, “A liar had need of a good memory,” lest he contradict at one time what he said at another: but truth is always consistent with itself, and needs nothing to help it out; it is always near at hand, and sits upon our lips, and is ready to drop out before we are aware: whereas a lie is troublesome, and sets a man’s invention upon the rack, and one trick needs a great many more to make it good.
With what reason canst thou expect that they children should follow thy good instructions, when thou thyself givest them an ill example? Thou dost but as it were beckon to them with they head, and shew them the way to heaven by thy good counsel, but thou takest them by the hand and leadest them in the way to hell by thy contrary example.
John Tillotson (1630–1694) English prelate, Archbishop of Canterbury
Sermon 62 “On the Education of Children”
Collected in The works of Dr. John Tillotson, Vol 3, ed. Thomas Birch (1820). Full text.
More commonly quoted in the paraphrase/modernization by John Charles Ryle, Bp. of Liverpool (1880-1900): "To give children good instruction, and a bad example, is but a beckoning to them with the head to show them the way to heaven, while we take them by the hand and lead them in the way to hell."