"There is no sinner like a young saint"
About this Quote
Aphra Behn lands this line like a needle: a pious compliment that turns, mid-prick, into an accusation. "Young saint" sounds like innocence on display, the kind that invites applause in polite company. Then the trap snaps shut. If there is "no sinner like" that figure, the real target is not youthful misbehavior so much as youthful purity weaponized - the person who believes their virtue is a personality.
Behn wrote for Restoration stages that thrived on exposing the hypocrisies of manners, marriage, and moral posturing. In that world, sainthood is often performance: a costume of chastity, obedience, or righteous outrage tailored to win power in a marketplace of reputations. Calling the saint a sinner isn't just scandal for its own sake; it's a critique of how moral absolutism becomes a kind of erotic and social leverage. The young are especially dangerous in this role because they can trade on freshness and certainty: they haven't yet accumulated compromises, so their judgments come off as clean, even holy. That clarity makes them effective, and intolerable.
The line also hints at a psychological flip side. Youthful sanctimony can mask curiosity, appetite, or ambition that has nowhere honest to go, so it burrows underground and returns as cruelty, secrecy, or sudden excess. Behn's punchline is that virtue without self-knowledge isn't virtue at all - it's just untested vanity. The "young saint" sins hardest because they sin while believing they're saving everyone else.
Behn wrote for Restoration stages that thrived on exposing the hypocrisies of manners, marriage, and moral posturing. In that world, sainthood is often performance: a costume of chastity, obedience, or righteous outrage tailored to win power in a marketplace of reputations. Calling the saint a sinner isn't just scandal for its own sake; it's a critique of how moral absolutism becomes a kind of erotic and social leverage. The young are especially dangerous in this role because they can trade on freshness and certainty: they haven't yet accumulated compromises, so their judgments come off as clean, even holy. That clarity makes them effective, and intolerable.
The line also hints at a psychological flip side. Youthful sanctimony can mask curiosity, appetite, or ambition that has nowhere honest to go, so it burrows underground and returns as cruelty, secrecy, or sudden excess. Behn's punchline is that virtue without self-knowledge isn't virtue at all - it's just untested vanity. The "young saint" sins hardest because they sin while believing they're saving everyone else.
Quote Details
| Topic | Ethics & Morality |
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