Quotes
Quotes about Soul
The religious desire and effort of the soul to relate itself and all its interest to God and his will, is prayer in the deepest sense. This is essential prayer: uttered or unexpressed, it is equally prayer. It is the soul's desire after God going forth in a manifestation, ... the soul striving after God. This is a prayer that may exist without ceasing, consisting, as it does, not in doing or saying this or that, but in temper and attitude of the spirit.
Commemoration of Denys, Bishop of Paris, & his Companions, Martyrs, 258 Commemoration of Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, Philosopher, Scientist, 1253 It is of the greatest importance for the soul to go to prayer with confidence, and such a pure and disinterested love as seeks nothing from the Father but the ability to please Him and to do His will; for a child who only proportions his diligence to his hope of reward renders himself unworthy of all reward. Go, then, to prayer, not that ye may enjoy spiritual delights, but that ye may be full or empty, just as it pleaseth God. This will preserve you in an evenness of spirit, either in desertion or in consolation, and will prevent your being surprised at dryness, or the apparent repulses of Him who is altogether Love. Constant prayer is to keep the heart always right towards God.
I read in Shakespeare of the majesty of the moral law, in Victor Hugo of the sacredness of childhood, in Tennyson the ugliness of hypocrisy, in George Eliot the supremacy of duty, in Dickens the divinity of kindness, and in Ruskin the dignity of service. Irving teaches me the lesson of cheerfulness, Hawthorne shows me the hatefulness of sin, Longfellow gives me the soft, tranquil music of hope. Lowell makes us feel that we must give ourselves to our fellow men. Whittier sings to me of divine Fatherhood and human brotherhood. These are Christian lessons: who inspired them? Who put it into the heart of Martin Luther to nail those theses on the church door of Wittenberg? Who stirred and fired the soul of Savonarola? Who thrilled and electrified the soul of John Wesley? Jesus Christ is back of these all.
True prayer is something more than desire. It is no mere subjective instinct, ... no blind outreach. If it met no response, no answer, it would soon be weeded out of the race. Prayer has stood the test of experience. In fact, the very desire to pray is in itself prophetic of a heavenly Friend. So this native need of the soul rose out of the divine origin of the soul, and it has steadily verified itself as a safe guide to reality. In the first instance it is not asking for anything, it is not petition; all it seeks is God Himself: Let me find Thee, let me know Thee, then I will ask of Thee.
Feast of All Souls If you ask me how I believe in God, how God creates Himself in me, and reveals Himself to me, my answer may perhaps provoke your smiles or laughter, and even scandalize you. I believe in God as I believe in my friends, because I feel the breath of His affection, feel His invisible and intangible hand drawing me, leading me, grasping me.
Before I can have any joy in being alone with God I must have learned not to fear being alone with myself. Shrinking from any deep self-scrutiny is by no means an uncommon thing, and often goes far to explain the feverish restlessness with which a world-loving heart plunges into perpetual rounds of gaieties and dissipations; they serve as an escape from troublesome questions about the soul, and help to get rid of the clamours of conscience.
God's manifestation of Himself has not been for our personal experience only, but all creation, and all time, all mankind and all man's life upon the earth, are manifestations of God; and the man turns to barrenness and folly who limits himself to his own narrow thought and futile endeavours. All human experience is revelation if the great purpose of life is the discipline of souls, and the one unchanging guidance for all men is duty.
Live your life from your heart. Share from your heart. And your story will touch and heal people's souls.
It is not 'seeing' the light that impacts one's life; it is never 'ceasing' to see the light that impresses one's life, spirit, heart and soul.
Open your mind to God's wisdom, open your soul to God's peace, open your heart to God's love and all three will stay with you forever.
Philosophy can not be attained from text on a page... it comes from with the soul.
I see myself as an intelligent, sensitive human, with the soul of a clown which forces me to blow it at the most important moments.
Electric communication will never be a substitute for the face of someone who with their soul encourages another person to be brave and true.
There are men who would quickly love each other if once they were speak to each other; for when they spoke they would discover that their souls had only separated by phantoms and delusions.
Communism is the death of the soul. It is the organization of total conformity--in short, of tyranny--and it is committed to making tyranny universal.
Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones.
Confession is always weakness. The grave soul keeps its own secrets, and takes its own punishment in silence.
Open confession is good for the soul.
Confession is good for the soul only in the sense that a tweed coat is good for dandruff--it is a palliative rather than a remedy.
There is no future pang Can deal that justice on the self condemn'd He deals on his own soul.
Two souls, alas! reside within my breast, and each withdraws from and repels its brother. [Ger., Zwei Seelen wohnen, ach! in meiner Brust, Die eine will sich von der andern trennen.]
He that has light within his own clear breast May sit i' the centre, and enjoy bright day: But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts Benighted walks under the mid-day sun; Himself his own dungeon.
Conscience is the voice of the soul; the passions of the body.
Conscience is the mirror of our souls, which represents the errors of our lives in their full shape.
Conscience is the mirror of our souls, which represents the errors of our lives in their full shape.
