Man, proud man, / Dress'd in a little brief authority; / Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd, / His glassy essence, like an angry ape, / Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven, / As make the angels weep.
Our vows are heard betimes! and Heaven takes care To grant, before we can conclude the prayer: Preventing angels met it half the way, And sent us back to praise, who came to pray.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
Count no duty too little, no round of life too small, no work too low, if it come in thy way, since God thinks so much of it as to send His angels to guard thee in it.--_Mark Guy Pearse._
Music is the language of the soul, but it defies interpretation. It means something, but that something belongs not to this world of sense and logic, but to another world, quite real, though beyond all definition.... Is there not in Music, and in Music alone of all the arts, something that is not entirely of this earth?... Whence comes melody? Surely not from anything that we hear with our outward ears and are able to imitate, to improve, or to sublimise.... Here if anywhere we see the golden stairs on which angels descend from heaven and whisper sweet sounds into the ears of those who have ears to hear. Words cannot be so inspired, for words, we know, are of the earth, earthy. Melodies are not of the earth, and it is truly said,
In heaven the angels are advancing continually to the spring-time of their youth, so that the oldest angel appears the youngest.
while it’s true that challenges do make us grow, the angels also say that peace leads to even bigger growth spurts. Through peace, our schedules and creativity are more open to giving service. Through peace, our bodies operate in a healthy fashion. Through peace, our relationships thrive and blossom. Through peace, we are shining examples of God’s love.
In such green palaces the first kings reign'd, Slept in their shades, and angels entertain'd; With such old counsellors they did advise, And by frequenting sacred groves grew wise.
Philips, whose touch harmonious could remove The pangs of guilty power and hapless love! Rest here, distressed by poverty no more; Here find that calm thou gav'st so oft before; Sleep undisturb'd within this peaceful shrine, Till angels wake thee with a note like thine!
Their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.
She was good as she was fair, None--none on earth above her! As pure in thought as angels are: To know her was to love her.
Thy purpose firm is equal to the deed: Who does the best his circumstance allows Does well, acts nobly; angels could no more.
I charge thee, fling away ambition; / By that sin fell the angels.
Like angels' visits, short and bright; / Mortality's too weak to bear them long.
Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread.
And yet, as angels in some brighter dreams Call to the soul when man doth sleep, So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes, And into glory peep.
We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Were we as eloquent as angels, we would please some men, some women, and some children much more by listening than by talking.
We are ne'er like angels till our passion dies.
Il est aux anges=--He is supremely happy (_lit._ with the angels).
Christianity ruined emperors, but saved peoples. It opened the palaces of Constantinople to the barbarians, but it opened the doors of cottages to the consoling angels of the Saviour.--_Alfred de Musset._
It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.
Our angels live in heaven, not on earth. We only recognise the angelic in man, even in those we love the most, when we can no longer see them. They are then nearer us than ever, we love them more than ever. Happy are those who have such angels in heaven, who draw our hearts away from earth and fill them with longing for our true home. They lighten the burden of life, they give a quiet, gentle tone to the joys of life, and they teach us to love those who are left to us on earth, it may be but for a few days or years, with a love which we never knew before, a love which bears all things, believes all things, and gladly pardons all things.
If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.
Tears such as angels weep.
But sad as angels for the good man's sin, Weep to record, and blush to give it in.
Soyons doux, si nous voulons etre regrettes. La hauteur du genie et les qualites superieures ne sont pleurees que des anges=--Let us be gentle if we would be regretted. The pride of genius and high talents are lamented only by angels.
But man, proud man, / Drest in a little brief authority, / Most ignorant of what he's most assured, / His glassy essence,--like an angry ape, / Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven / As make the angels weep.
It is by suffering that human beings become angels.
In this theatre of man's life, it is reserved only for God and angels to look on.
Sundays observe; think when the bells do chime, 'T is angels' music.
You can get lost on your way home. You can get lost looking for love. You can get lost between jobs. You can get lost looking for God. However it happens, take heart. Others before you have found a way in the wilderness, where there are as many angels as there are wild beasts, and plenty of other lost people too. All it takes is one of them to find you. All it takes is you to find one of them. However it happens, you could do worse than to kneel down and ask a blessing, remembering how many knees have kissed this altar before you.
O limed soul, that, struggling to be free, Art more engag'd! Help, angels! Make assay! Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel, Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!
The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall.
The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone.--_George Eliot._
If within the sophisticated man there is not an unsophisticated one, then he is but one of the devil's angels.
How remarkable and how beautiful it is that the last page of the Revelation should come bending round to touch the first page of Genesis. The history of man began with angels with frowning faces and flaming swords barring the way to the Tree of Life. It ends with the guard of cherubim withdrawn; or rather, perhaps, sheathing their swords and becoming guides to the no longer forbidden fruit, instead of being its guards. That is the Bible's grand symbolical way of saying that all between--the sin, the misery, the death--is a parenthesis. God's purpose is not going to be thwarted. The end of His majestic march through history is to be men's access to the Tree of Life, from which, for the dreary ages--that are but as a moment in the great eternities--they were barred out by their sin,--_Alex. McLaren._
Sundays observe; think when the bells do chime, / 'Tis angels' music, therefore come not late.
To the Christian, whose life has been dark with brooding cares that would not lift themselves, and on whom chilling rains of sorrow have fallen at intervals through all his years, death is but the clearing-up shower; and just behind it are the songs of angels, and the serenity and glory of heaven.--_Beecher._
Non Angli, sed angeli=--Not Angles, but angels. _Gregory the Great, on seeing some captive British youths for sale in the slave-market at Rome._
She was a form of life and light That seen, became a part of sight, And rose, where'er I turn'd mine eye, The morning-star of memory! Yes, love indeed is light from heaven; A spark of that immortal fire With angels shared, by Alla given, To lift from earth our low desire.
Like angels' visits, few and far between.
In spiritual as in earthly things there is great strength in hope, and, therefore, God's people are carefully to cultivate that grace. A well-grounded hope that, having been made new creatures in Jesus Christ, we are His; that with our names, though unknown to fame, written in the Book of Life, we have grace in possession and heaven in prospect; that after a few more brief years, pure as the angels that sing before the throne, we shall be brought with gladness into the palace of the King, to be like Christ and with Christ, seeing Him eye to eye and face to face--such hopes are powerful springs of action.--_Guthrie._
He who loves goodness harbours angels, reveres reverence, and lives with God.
Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
It is in the path where God has bade us walk that we shall find the angels around us. We may meet them, indeed, on paths of our own choosing, but it will be the sort of angel that Balaam met, with a sword in his hand, mighty and beautiful, but wrathful too; and we had better not front him! But the friendly helpers, the emissaries of God's love, the apostles of His grace, do not haunt the roads that we make for ourselves.--_Alex. McLaren._
The good he scorn'd Stalk'd off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost, Not to return; or if it did, in visits Like those of angels, short and far between.
For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
We are risen apes, not fallen angels—and we now have the evidence to prove it.
The saints have their empire, their glory, their victory, their lustre, and want no glory of the flesh or of the mind, with which they have nothing to do, for these add nothing to them neither do they take away. They are seen of God and the angels, and not by the bodily eye, nor by the curious spirit; God suffices them.
In pride, in reasoning pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes: Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell, Aspiring to be angels, men rebel.
I charge thee, fling away ambition: By that sin fell the angels.
The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone.
There has been no entirely new religion since the beginning of the world. The elements and roots of religion were there, as far back as we can trace the history of man; and the history of religion shows us throughout a succession of new combinations of the same radical elements. An intuition of God, a sense of human weakness and dependence, a belief in a Divine government of the world, a distinction between good and evil, and a hope of a better life, these are some of the radical elements of all religions. Though sometimes hidden, they rise again and again to the surface. Though frequently distorted, they tend again and again to their perfect form. Unless they had formed part of the original dowry of the human soul, religion would have remained an impossibility, and the tongues of angels would have been to human ears but as sounding brass, or as tinkling cymbals.
"Fools rush where Angels fear to tread!" Angels and Fools have equal claim To do what Nature bids them do, sans hope of praise, sans fear of blame!
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.
The ultimate, angels' law, Indulging every instinct of the soul There where law, life, joy, impulse are one thing!
Everything holy is before what is unholy; guilt presupposes innocence, not the reverse; angels, but not fallen ones, were created.
~Angels.~--In old days there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the city of destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. But yet men are led away from threatening destruction: a hand is put in theirs, which leads them forth gently towards a calm and bright land, so that they look no more backward; and the hand may be a little child's.--_George Eliot._
What is our pen doing? Is it adding joy to other men's lives? If so, then angels may tune their harps when we sit at our desk. They are sent to minister to the heirs of salvation, and would be glad to look upon our pen as writing music for them to sing, because what we write makes their client's joy to be full.--_Thomas Champness._
The glorious fault of angels and of gods.
Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels.
The human heart is like heaven; the more angels the more room.
Suppose two persons tell foolish stories, one whose words have a two-fold sense, understood only by his own followers, the other which has only the one sense, a stranger not being in the secret, who hears them both speak in this manner, would pass on them a like judgment. But if afterwards in the rest of their conversation one speak with the tongue of angels, and the other mere wearisome common-places, he will judge that the one spoke in mysteries and not the other; the one having sufficiently shown that he was incapable of absurdity, and capable of being mysterious, the other that he is incapable of mystery, and capable of absurdity.
I saw an angel close by me, on my left side, in bodily form. This I am not accustomed to see, unless very rarely. Though I have visions of angels frequently, yet I see them only by an intellectual vision, such as I have spoken of before. It was our Lord's will that in this vision I should see the angel in this wise. He was not large, but small of stature, and most beautiful \x97 his face burning, as if he were one of the highest angels, who seem to be all of fire: they must be those whom we call cherubim.
He pass'd the flaming bounds of place and time: The living throne, the sapphire blaze, Where angels tremble while they gaze, He saw; but blasted with excess of light, Closed his eyes in endless night.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
Reputation is what men and women think of us. Character is what God and angels know of us.
When Britain first, at Heaven's command, Arose from out the azure main, This was the charter of her land, And guardian angels sung the strain: Rule, Britannia! Britannia rules the waves! Britons never shall be slaves.
O bitte um Leben noch! du fuhlst, mit deinen Mangeln, / Dass du noch wandeln kannst nicht unter Gottes Engeln=--O still pray for life; thou feelest that with those faults of thine thou canst not walk among the angels of God. _Ruckert._ [Greek: ho bios brachys, he de techne makre]--Life is short, art is long.
Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels' hierarchies? and even if one of them suddenly pressed me against his heart, I would perish in the embrace of his stronger existence. For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror which we are barely able to endure and are awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us. Each single angel is terrifying.
Could we forbear dispute and practise love, We should agree as angels do above.
Man is his own star; and the soul that can Render an honest and a perfect man Commands all light, all influence, all fate. Nothing to him falls early, or too late. Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.
We may have once been slugs, and may one day be angels, but we are men now; and we must, as men, do our work honourably and thoroughly.
I would like the angels of Heaven to be among us. I would like an abundance of peace. I would like full vessels of charity. I would like rich treasures of mercy. I would like cheerfulness to preside over all. I would like Jesus to be present.
As far as angels' ken.
Could we forbear dispute and practise love, / We should agree as angels do above.
But man, proud man, Drest in a little brief authority, Most ignorant of what he 's most assured, His glassy essence, like an angry ape, Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven As make the angels weep.
Women who have lost their faith / Are angels who have lost their wings.
The best of angels do not live in community, but by themselves.
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful Lo! We revealed it on the Night of Predestination. Ah, what will convey unto thee what the Night of Power is! The Night of Power is better than a thousand months. The angels and the Spirit descend therein, by the permission of their Lord, with all decrees. (The night is) Peace until the rising of the dawn.
Who does the best his circumstance allows, / Does well, does nobly; angels could no more.
Think of that mystic ladder, which descends from the throne of God to the spot, however lowly, where you may be. It may be a moorland waste; a humble cottage; a ship's cabin; a settler's hut; a bed of pain; but Jesus Christ finds you out, and comes just where you are. The one pole of this ladder is the gold of His deity; the other is the silver of His manhood; the rungs are the series of events from the cradle of Bethlehem to the right hand of power, where He sits. That ladder sways beneath a weight of blessing for you. Oh, that you would send away your burdens of sin, and care, and fear, by the hands of the ascending angels of prayer and faith!--so as to be able to receive into your heart the trooping angels of peace, and joy, and love, and glory.--_F. B. Meyer._
Stretch or contract me, Thy poor debtor; This is but tuning of my breast, To make the music better. Whether I fly with angels, fall with dust, Thy hands made both, and I am there; Thy power and love, my love and trust Make one place ev'rywhere.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. 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.
I thank God, that if I am gifted with little of the spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet none, as I trust, of that other spirit which would drag angels down.