When a man is treated with solemnity, he looks upon himself as a higher being, and goes through his solemn feasts devoutly.
Empfindliche Ohren sind, bei Madchen so gut als bei Pferden, gute Gesundheitszeichen=--In maidens as well as in horses, sensitive ears are signs of good health.
Satan himself is now transformed into an angel of light.
The greatest of heroic deeds are those which are performed within four walls and in domestic privacy.
Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.
The man whom grown-up people love, children love still more.
"Three o'clock is always too late or too early for anything you want to do."
O thou who hast still a father and a mother, thank God for it in the day when thy soul is full of joyful tears, and needs a bosom wherein to shed them.
Memory= (_Erinnerung_) =is the only paradise out of which we cannot be driven.
Place moral heroes in the field, and heroines will follow them as brides.
I've got nothing to do today but smile.
Many flowers open to the sun, but only one follows him constantly. Heart, be thou the sunflower, not only open to receive God's blessing, but constant in looking to Him.
One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.
If life, like the olive, is a bitter fruit, then grasp both with the press and they will yield the sweetest oil.
Poetry incorporates those spirits which, like angels, can never assume the body of an outward act; and sheds the perfume of those flowers which spring up but never bear any seed.
Art is not the bread indeed, but it is the wine of life.
This is what we call love. When you are loved, you can do anything in creation. When you are loved, there's no need at all to understand what's happening, because everything happens within you.
Fight the good fight.
Love requires not so much proofs as expressions of love.
Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth.
A single act of resignation to the divine will in what it ordains contrary to our desires, is of more value than a hundred thousand successes conformable to our will and taste.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
He who submits himself to God in all things is certain that whatever men say or do against him will always turn to his advantage.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
When we love, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.
Feelings come and go like light troops following the victory of the present; but principles, like troops of the line, are undisturbed, and stand fast.
Men and cucumbers are worth nothing as soon as they are ripe.
In science the new is an advance; but in morals, as contradicting our inner ideals and historic idols, it is ever a retrogression.
We should not spare expense, fatigue, nor even our life, when there is a question of accomplishing the holy will of God.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Without a God there is for man neither purpose, nor goal, nor hope, only a wavering future, an eternal dread of every darkness.
If any would not work, neither should he eat.
Adults are always asking little kids what they want to be when they grow up ’cause they’re looking for ideas.
Afflictions are the most certain proofs that God can give us of His love for us.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Oh, but to get through this night. Why won’t sleep come? What’s bothering me here in the dark? It’s not the badgers, it’s not the snakes. What’s bothering me? Something darker is worrying a hole inside me—look how my legs are trembling. Stop moving, Tatiana. That’s how the carnivores find you, by the flash of life on your body, they find you and eat you while you sleep. Like venomous spiders, they’ll bite you first to lull you into sleep—you won’t even feel it—and then they will gnaw your flesh until nothing remains. But even the animals eating her alive was not the thing that worried the sick hole in Tatiana’s stomach as she lay in the leaves with her face hidden from the forest, with her arms over her head, in case anything decided to fall on her. She should’ve made herself a shelter but it got dark so fast, and she was so sure she would find the lake, she hadn’t been thinking of making herself more comfortable in the woods. She kept walking and walking, and then was downed and breathless and unprepared for pitch black night. To quell the terror inside her, to not hear her own voices, Tatiana whimpered. Lay and cried, low and afraid. What was tormenting her from the inside out? Was it worry over Marina? No... not quite. But close. Something about Marina. Something about Saika... Saika. The girl who caused trouble between Dasha and her dentist boyfriend, the girl who pushed her bike into Tatiana’s bike to make her fall under the tires of a downward truck rushing headlong... the girl who saw Tatiana’s grandmother carrying a sack of sugar and told her mother who told her father who told the Luga Soviet that Vasily Metanov harbored sugar he had no intention of giving up? The girl who did something so unspeakable with her own brother she was nearly killed by her own father’s hand—and she herself had said the boy got worse—and this previously unmentioned brother was, after all, dead. The girl who stood unafraid under rowan trees and sat under a gaggle of crows and did not feel black omens, the girl who told Tatiana her wicked stories, tempted Tatiana with her body, turned away from Marina as Marina was drowning...who turned Marina against Tatiana, the girl who didn’t believe in demons, who thought everything was all good in the universe, could she . . . What if...? What if this was not an accident? Moaning loudly, Tatiana turned away to the other side as if she’d just had a nightmare. But she hadn’t been dreaming. Saika took her compass and her knife. But Marina took her watch. And there it was. That was the thing eating up Tatiana from the inside out. Could Marina have been in on something like this? Twisting from side to side did not assuage her torn stomach, did not mollify her sunken heart. Making anguished noises, her eyes closed, she couldn’t think of fields, or Luga, or swimming, or clover or warm milk, anything. All good thoughts were drowned in the impossible sorrow. Could Marina have betrayed her?
We should not examine articles of faith with a curious and subtle spirit. It is sufficient for us to know that the Church proposes them. We can never be deceived in believing them.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
An un-blossomed rose, in the garden we want to grow.
To judge rightly of the goodness and perfection of any one's prayer, it is sufficient to know the disposition he takes to it, and the fruits he reaps from it.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul. ― George Bernard Shaw
Universal love is a glove without fingers, which fits all hands alike, and none closely; but true affection is like a glove with fingers, which fits one hand only, and sits close to that one.
Don't waste your time with explanations: people only hear what they want to hear.
Creation lies before us like a glorious rainbow; but the sun that made it lies behind us, hidden from us.
The world having grown old in these carnal errors, Jesus Christ came at the time foretold, but not with the expected glory, and therefore men did not think it was he. After his death Saint Paul came to teach that all these things had happened in figures, that the Kingdom of God was not in the flesh, but in the spirit; that the enemies of men were not the Babylonians, but the passions; that God delighted not in temples made with hands, but in a pure and contrite heart; that bodily circumcision was unprofitable, but that of the heart was needed; that Moses gave them not that bread from heaven, etc.
No man needs money so much as he who despises it.
If pain must come, may it come quickly. Because I have a life to live, and I need to live it in the best way possible. If he has to make a choice, may he make it now. Then I will either wait for him or forget him.
The limbs of my buried ones touched cold on my soul and drove away its blots, as dead hands heal eruptions of the skin.
The most powerful weapon to conquer the devil is humility. For, as he does not know at all how to employ it, neither does he know how to defend himself from it.
The immortal soul must give itself to something that is immortal. And the only immortal things are these: "Now abideth faith, hope, love, but the greatest of these is love." Some think the time may come when two of these three things will also pass away--faith into sight, hope into fruition. Paul does not say so. We know but little now about the conditions of the life that is to come. But what is certain is that Love must last. God, the Eternal God, is Love. Covet therefore that everlasting gift. The Greatest Thing in the World, pp. 54, 55.
Every man shall bear his own burden.
The grace of perseverance is the most important of all; it crowns all other graces.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
We have exchanged the Washingtonian dignity for the Jeffersonian simplicity, which was in truth only another name for the Jacksonian vulgarity.
The canary-bird sings the sweeter the longer it has been trained in a darkened cage.
Courage consists not in blindly overlooking danger, but in meeting it with the eyes open.
We should abandon ourselves entirely into the hands of God, and believe that His providence disposes everything that He wishes or permits to happen to us for our greater good.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
All strength lies within, not without.
Feelings are always purest and most glowing in the hour of meeting and farewell; like the glaciers, which are transparent and rose-hued only at sunrise and sunset, but throughout the day grey and cold.
After knowing the will of God in regard to a work which we undertake, we should continue courageously, however difficult it may be. We should follow it to the end with as much constancy as the obstacles we encounter are great.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
How is each of us so lonely in the wide bosom of the All?
We should never abandon, on account of the difficulties we encounter, an enterprise undertaken with due reflection.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
There is nothing more holy, more eminently perfect, than resignation to the will of God, which confirms us in an entire detachment from ourselves, and a perfect indifference for every condition in which we may be placed.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Charms which, like flowers, lie on the surface and always glitter, easily produce vanity; whereas other excellences, which lie deep like gold and are discovered with difficulty, leave their possessors modest and proud.
Nature sent women into the world that they might be mothers and love children, to whom sacrifices must ever be offered, and from whom none can be obtained.
The end we aim at must be known before the way.
When you find your path, you must not be afraid. You need to have sufficient courage to make mistakes. Disappointment, defeat, and despair are the tools God uses to show us the way.
Let not the sun go down upon your wrath=, _i.e._, let it set with the sun, or, as Ruskin suggests, let it never go down so long as the wrong is there.
A Roman divorced from his wife, being highly blamed by his friends, who demanded, "Was she not chaste? Was she not fair? Was she not fruitful?" holding out his shoe, asked them whether it was not new and well made. "Yet," added he, "none of you can tell where it pinches me."
To die for truth is not to die for one's country but to die for the world.
Nature has directly formed woman to be a mother, only indirectly to be a wife; man, on the contrary, is rather made to be a husband than a father.
Among nations the head has alway preceded the heart by centuries.
The purer the golden vessel the more readily is it bent; the higher worth of women is sooner lost than that of men.
In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in the case of poetry, it's the exact opposite!
Every age regards the dawning of new light as the destroying fire of morality; while that very age itself, with heart uninjured, finds itself raised one degree of light above the preceding.
To love all mankind, from the greatest to the lowest, a cheerful state of being is required; but in order to see into mankind, into life, and still more into ourselves, suffering is requisite.
We should consider our departed brethren as living members of Jesus Christ, animated by His grace, and certain of participating one day of His glory. We should therefore love, serve, and assist them as far as is in our power.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Science cannot be stopped. Man will gather knowledge no matter what the consequences — and we cannot predict what they will be. Science will go on — whether we are pessimistic, or are optimistic, as I am. I know that great, interesting, and valuable discoveries can be made and will be made… But I know also that still more interesting discoveries will be made that I have not the imagination to describe — and I am awaiting them, full of curiosity and enthusiasm.
If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars.
Bodily exercise profiteth little.
The words that a father speaks to his children in the privacy of home are not heard by the world, but, as in whispering-galleries, they are clearly heard at the end and by posterity.
I write from instinct, from inexplicable sparkle. I don't know why I'm writing what I'm writing. Usually, I sit and I let my hands wander on my guitar. And I sing anything. I play anything. And I wait till I come across a pleasing accident. Then I start to develop it. Once you take a piece of musical information, there are certain implications that it automatically contains — the implication of that phrase elongated, contracted, or inverted or in another time signature. So you start with an impulse and go to what your ear likes.
Men, like bullets, go farthest when they are smoothest.
Noah found grace in the same way that Paul obtained mercy (1 Tim. 1: 16), namely, by mercy's taking hold of him.--_Selected._
Let every minute be a full life to thee.
We meet with contradictions everywhere. If only two persons are together they mutually afford each other opportunities of exercising patience, and even when one is alone there will still be a necessity for this virtue, so true it is that our miserable life is full of crosses.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go in harm's way.
Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.
Humility is the virtue of Our Lord Jesus Christ, of His blessed Mother, and of the greatest saints. It embraces all virtues and, where it is sincere, introduces them into the soul.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
Death gives us sleep, eternal youth, and immortality.
Music is the only one of the fine arts in which not only man, but all other animals, have a common property.
There is a certain noble pride through which merits shine brighter than through modesty.
We find God twice--once within, once without us; within us as an eye, without us as a light.
We conceive, I think, more nobly of the weak presence of Paul than of the fair and ruddy countenance of David.
What boots the hero-arm without a hero-eye?
So, I love you because the entire universe conspired to help me find you.
Reading was my escape and my comfort, my consolation, my stimulant of choice: reading for the pure pleasure of it, for the beautiful stillness that surrounds you when you hear an author's words reverberating in your head.
Other exercises develop single powers and muscles, but dancing, like a corporeal poesy, embellishes, exercises, and equalises all the muscles at once.
You wish, O woman, to be ardently loved, and for ever, even until death, be thou the mother of your children.
Hope is the ruddy morning ray of joy, recollection is its golden tinge; but the latter is wont to sink amid the dews and dusky shades of twilight, and the bright blue day which the former promises breaks indeed, but in another world and with another sun.
It's more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.
The clear purpose of the leader is to give a clear purpose to the team.
None of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet still we go forward. Because we trust. Because we have Faith.
Remembrance= (_Erinnerung_) =is the only Paradise from which we cannot be driven.
Letters that are warmly sealed are often coldly opened.
And it is this rational ground of belief which the writers of the Gospels, no less than Paul, and Eginhard, and Fox, so little dream of offering that they would regard the demand for it as a kind of blasphemy.
In the light of today’s “new things,” we have reread the relationship between individual or private property and the universal destination of material wealth . Man fulfills himself by using his intelligence and freedom. In so doing a person utilizes the things of this world as objects and instruments and makes them his own. The foundation of the right to private initiative and ownership is to be found in this activity. By means of his work a person commits himself, not only for his own sake but also for others and with others . Man works in order to provide for the needs of his family, his community, his nation, and ultimately all humanity. Moreover, a person collaborates in the work of his fellow employees, as well as in the work of suppliers and in the customers’ use of goods, in a progressively expanding chain of solidarity. Ownership of the means of production, whether in industry or agriculture, is just and legitimate if it serves useful work. It becomes illegitimate, however, when it is not utilized or when it serves to impede the work of others, in an effort to gain a profit which is not the result of the overall expansion of work and the wealth of society, but rather is the result of curbing them or of illicit exploitation, speculation or the breaking of solidarity among working people. Ownership of this kind has no justification, and represents an abuse in the sight of God and man. [ Centesimus Annus, §43. 1991.]
Honour to whom honour is due.
Say not, We will suffer, for that ye must; say rather, We will act, for that ye must not= (_i.e._, we are compelled to do the one, but not the other).
How do I guess at the future? Based on the omens of the present. The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it.And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better
We darken the cages of birds when we would teach them to sing.
Prayer purifies; it is a self-preached sermon.
There is only one thing infamous in love, and that is a falsehood.
Nature can afford to be prodigal in everything, the artist must be frugal down to the last detail. Nature is garrulous to the point of confusion, let the artist be truly taciturn.
Animals can enjoy, but only men can be cheerful.
The sublime is the temple-step of religion, as the stars are of immeasurable space. When what is mighty appears in nature--a storm, thunder, the starry firmament, death--then utter the word "God" before the child. A great misfortune, a great blessing, a great crime, a noble action, are building-sites for a child's church.
Old age is sad= (_trube_), =not because our joys, but because our hopes are cut short.
Don't give in to your fears. If you do, you won't be able to talk to your heart.
Man, behind his everlasting blind, which he only colours differently, and makes no thinner, carries his pride with him from one step to another, and on the higher step blames only the pride of the lower.
What makes old age so sad is, not that our joys, but that our hopes then cease.
Having food and raiment, let us be therewith content.
Look upon every day, O youth, as the whole of life, not merely as a section, and enjoy the present without wishing, through haste, to spring on to another.
Do not allow your daughters to be taught letters by a man, though he be a St. Paul or a St Francis of Assisi. The saints are in heaven.
Behold now is the accepted time.
Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how to answer every man.
Provide things honest in the sight of all men.
Our perfection consists in uniting our will so intimately with God's will, that we will only desire what He wills. He who conforms most perfectly to the will of God will be the most perfect Christian.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
No one saves us but ourselves, No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path Buddhas merely teach the way. By ourselves is evil done, By ourselves we pain endure, By ourselves we cease from wrong, By ourselves become we pure.
Every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God.
Every man deems that he has precisely the trials and temptations which are the hardest to bear; but they are so because they are the very ones he needs.
The thought of the presence of God renders us familiar with the practice of doing in all things His holy will.--ST. VINCENT DE PAUL.
He who finds a God in the physical world will also find one in the moral, which is History.
That which produces and maintains cheerfulness is nothing but activity.
Woman's virtue is the music of stringed instruments, which sound best in a room; but man's that of wind instruments, which sound best in the open air.
What built St. Paul's Cathedral? Look at the heart of the matter, it was that divine Hebrew Book, the word partly of the man Moses, an outlaw tending his Midianitish herds four thousand years ago in the wildernesses of Sinai!
Life has no meaning a priori...It is up to you to give it a meaning, and value is nothing but the meaning that you choose.
Ernste Thatigkeit sohnt suletzt immer mit dem Leben aus=--Earnest activity always reconciles us with life in the end.
The more sand has escaped from the hour-glass of our life, the clearer we should see through it.
No rest is worth anything except the rest that is earned.
I can't see why anybody unless he was a child, or an angel, or a lucky simpleton like the pilgrim would even want to say a prayer to a Jesus who was the least bit different from the way he looks and sounds in the New Testament. My God! He's only the most intelligent man in the Bible, that's all! Who isn't he head and shoulders over? Who? Both Testaments are full of pundits, prophets, disciples, favorite sons, Solomons, Isaiahs, Davids, Pauls but, my God, who besides Jesus really knew which end was up? Nobody. Not Moses. Don't tell me Moses. He was a nice man, and he kept in beautiful touch with his God, and all that but that's exactly the point. He had to keep in touch. Jesus realized there is no separation from God.
What do I really want in life: the success of God’s agenda of grace or the fulfillment of my catalog of desires?
Every one of the names given to this infinite Being by finite beings marks a stage in the evolution of religious truth. If once we try to understand these names, we shall find that they were all well meant, that, for the time being, they were probably the only possible names. The Historical School does not look upon all the names given to divine powers as simply true or simply false. We look upon all of them as well meant and true for the time being, as steps on the ladder on which the angels of God ascend and descend. There was no harm in the ancient people, when they were thirsting for rain, invoking the sky, and saying, 'O, dear sky, send us rain!' And when after a time they used more and more general words, when they addressed the powers (of nature) as bright, or rich, or mighty, all these were meant for something else, for something they were seeking for, if haply they might feel after Him and find Him. This is St. Paul's view of the growth of religion.
God is at once the great original I and Thou.
Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known. And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.