Requite Quotes & Sayings

The right way to requite evil, according to Jesus, is not to resist it. This saying of Christ removes the Church from the sphere of politics and law. — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Cornelius Tacitus when he says, that men are readier to pay back injuries than benefits, since to requite a benefit is felt to be a burthen, to return an injury a gain. — Niccolo Machiavelli

The gods, (if gods to goodness are inclined If acts of mercy touch their heavenly mind), And, more than all the gods, your generous heart, Conscious of worth, requite its own desert! — John Dryden

The Christian must treat his enemy as a brother, and requite his hostility with love. His behavior must be determined not by the way others treat him, but by the treatment he himself receives from Jesus; it has only one source, and that is the will of Jesus. — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

It is never right to do wrong or to requite wrong with wrong, or when we suffer evil to defend ourselves by doing evil in return. — Socrates

Benefits received are a delight to us as long as we think we can requite them; when that possibility is far exceeded, they are repaid with hatred instead of gratitude. — Tacitus

There is not on earth so base a knave as the man who wins the love of a woman when he knows that he cannot or ought not to requite it. — Henry Ward Beecher

You find in some a sort of graceless modesty, that makes them ashamed to requite an obligation. — Seneca The Younger

Built into human makeup is a longing for a 'more' that the world of everyday experience cannot requite. — Huston Smith

You will have a growing knack for gravitating toward wilder, wetter, more interesting problems. More and more, you will be drawn to the kind of gain that doesn't requite pain. You'll be so alive and awake that you'll cheerfully push yourself out of your comfort zone in the direction of your personal frontier well before you're forced to do so by divine kicks in the ass. — Rob Brezsny

We can more easily avenge an injury than requite a kindness; on this account, because there is less difficulty in getting the better of the wicked than in making one's self equal with the good. — Marcus Tullius Cicero

Requite injury with kindness. — Laozi

It is always easier to requite an injury than a service: gratitude is a burden, but revenge is found to pay. — Tacitus

If you have an enemy, do not requite him evil with good, for that would put him to shame. Rather prove that he did you some good. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Earthly greatness is a nice thing, and requires so much chariness in the managing, as the contentment of it cannot requite. — Joseph Hall

Men are more prone to revenge injuries than to requite kindness. — Thomas Fuller

But if you have an enemy, do not requite him evil with good, for that would put him to shame. Rather prove that he did you some good.
And rather be angry than put to shame. And if you are cursed, I do not like that you want to bless. Rather join a little in the cursing. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Take you example by this thing,/ And yield to each his right,/ Lest God with such like miserye/ Your wicked minds requite — Various

When, however, you have an enemy, then do not requite him good for evil: for that would shame him. Instead, prove that he did some good for you. And rather be angry than put to shame! And when you are cursed, I do not like it that you want to bless. Rather curse a little also! And if you are done a great injustice, then quickly add five small ones. Hideous to behold is he who is obsessed with an injustice. — Friedrich Nietzsche

It seems clear at last that our love for the natural world-Nature-is the only means by which we can requite God's obvious love for it. — Edward Abbey