Murder in the Cathedral Quotes

“Unreal friendship may turn to real
But real friendship, once ended, cannot be mended”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“The last act is the greatest treason. To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“This is one moment, / But know that another / Shall pierce you with a sudden painful joy.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“What day is the day that we know that we hope for or fear for? Every day is the day we should fear from or hope from. One moment Weighs like another. Only in retrospection, selection, We say, that was the day. The critical moment That is always now, and here.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“A christian martyrdom is never an accident, for Saints are not made by accident.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“We acknowledge our trespass, our weakness, our fault; we acknowledge That the sin of the world is upon our heads; that the blood of the martyrs and the agony of the saints Is upon our heads. Lord, have mercy upon us. Christ, have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us. Blessed Thomas, pray for us.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“A martyrdom is always the design of God, for His love of men, to warn them and to lead them, to bring them back to His ways. It is never the design of man; for the true martyr is he who has become the instrument of God, who has lost his will in the will of God, and who no longer desires anything for himself, not even the glory of being a martyr.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“We have only to conquer
Now, by suffering. This is the easier victory.
Now is the triumph of the cross.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“They know and do not know, that acting is suffering
And suffering is action. Neither does the actor suffer
Nor the patient act. But both are fixed
To an eternal action, an eternal patience
To which all must consent that it may be willed
And which all must suffer that they may will it,
That the pattern may subsist, for the pattern is the action
And the suffering, that the wheel may turn and still
Be forever still.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“I see nothing quite conclusive in the art of temporal government,
But violence, duplicity and frequent malversation.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“It is the just man who Like a bold lion, should be without fear.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“Friendship should be more than biting Time can sever.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“Meanwhile the substance of our first act
Will be shadows, and the strife with shadows.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“We are not here to triumph by fighting, by stratagem, or by resistance,
Not to fight with beasts as men. We have fought the beast
And have conquered. We have only to conquer
Now, by suffering.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“We do not know very much of the future / Except that from generation to generation / The same things happen again and again. / Men learn little from others' experience.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“Only / The fool, fixed in his folly, may think / He can turn the wheel on which he turns.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“The last temptation is the greatest treason: / To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“For those who serve the greater cause may make the cause serve them, / Still doing right: and striving with political men / May make that cause political, not by what they do / But by what they are.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“Man’s life is a cheat and a disappointment;
All things are unreal,
Unreal or disappointing:
The Catherine wheel, the pantomime cat,
The prizes given at the children’s party,
The prize awarded for the English Essay,
The scholar’s degree, the statesman’s decoration.
All things become less real, man passes
From unreality to unreality.
This man is obstinate, blind, intent
On self-destruction,
Passing from deception to deception,
From grandeur to grandeur to final illusion,
Lost in the wonder of his own greatness,
The enemy of society, enemy of himself.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“The last temptation is the greatest treason:
To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral

“What is woven on the loom of fate
What is woven in the councils of princes
Is woven also in our veins, our brains,
Is woven like a pattern of living worms
In the guts of the women of Canterbury”
― T.S. Eliot, Murder in the Cathedral