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The Whole History Of The Christian Life Is A Series Of Resurrections. . . . Every Time We Find Our Hearts Are Troubled, That We Are Not Rejoicing In God, A Resurrection Must Follow; A Resurrection Out Of The Night Of Troubled Thought Into The Gladness Of The Truth.

-George MacDonald

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The Whole History Of

George MacDonald

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The Whole History Of The Christian Life Is A Series Of Resurrections. . . . Every Time We Find Our Hearts Are Troubled, That We Are Not Rejoicing In God, A Resurrection Must Follow; A Resurrection Out Of The Night Of Troubled Thought Into The Gladness Of The Truth.

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The Kingdom Of Heaven Is Not Come Even When God's Will Is Our Law; It Is Fully Come When God's Will Is Our Will.

Never Be Discouraged Because Good Things Get On So Slowly Here; And Never Fail Daily To Do That Good Which Lies Next To Your Hand.

We Are Dwellers In A Divine Universe Where No Desires Are In Vain - If Only They Be Large Enough.

Philosophy Is Really Homesickness.

A Perfect Faith Would Lift Us Absolutely Above Fear

Attitudes Are More Important Than Facts.

Heaven...a Place Where Everything That Is Not Music Is Silence.

There Is An Aching That Is Worse Than Any Pain.

Trust To God To Weave Your Thread Into The Great Web, Though The Pattern Shows It Not Yet.

For The Greatest Fool And Rascal In Creation There Is Yet A Worse Condition; And That Is, Not To Know It, But To Think Himself A Respectable Man.

When We Understand The Outside Of Things, We Think We Have Them. Yet The Lord Puts His Things In Subdefined, Suggestive Shapes, Yielding No Satisfactory Meaning To The Mere Intellect, But Unfolding Themselves To The Conscience And Heart.

But We Believe – Nay, Lord We Only Hope, That One Day We Shall Thank Thee Perfectly For Pain And Hope And All That Led Or Drove Us Back Into The Bosom Of Thy Love.

The Root Of All Rebellion: It Is Because We Are Not Near Enough To Thee To Partake Of Thy Liberty That We Want A Liberty Of Our Own Different From Thine.

Here I Should Like To Remark, For The Sake Of Princes And Princesses In General, That It Is A Low And Contemptible Thing To Refuse To Confess A Fault, Or Even An Error. If A True Princess Has Done Wrong, She Is Always Uneasy Until She Has Had An Opportunity Of Throwing The Wrongness Away From Her By Saying: 'i Did It; And I Wish I Had Not; And I Am Sorry For Having Done It.

There Is No Strength In Unbelief. Even The Unbelief Of What Is False Is No Source Of Might. It Is The Truth Shining From Behind That Gives The Strength To Disbelieve.

We Are Often Unable To Tell People What They Need To Know, Because They Want To Know Something Else, And Would Therefore Only Misunderstand What We Said.

Doubts Are The Messengers Of The Living One To The Honest. They Are The First Knock At Our Door Of Things That Are Not Yet, But Have To Be, Understood. . . . Doubts Must Precede Every Deeper Assurance; For Uncertainties Are What We First See When We Look Into A Region Hitherto Unknown, Unexplored, Unannexed.

A Fairytale Is Not An Allegory. There May Be Allegory In It, But It Is Not An Allegory.

Love Makes Everything Lovely; Hate Concentrates Itself On The One Thing Hated.

Things Come To The Poor That Can't Get In At The Door Of The Rich. Their Money Somehow Blocks It Up. It Is A Great Privilege To Be Poor--one That No Man Covets, And Brat A Very Few Have Sought To Retain, But One That Yet Many Have Learned To Prize.

Fear Is Faithlessness.

I Tell You, There Are More Worlds, And More Doors To Them, Than You Will Think Of In Many Years!

All Love Will, One Day, Meet With Its Return. All True Love Will, One Day, Behold Its Own Image In The Eyes Of The Beloved, And Be Humbly Glad.

The Holy Spirit Of The Spring Is Working Silently.

We Are Not Made For Law, We Are Made For Love.

There Is This Difference Between The Growth Of Some Human Beings And That Of Others: In The One Case It Is A Continuous Dying, In The Other A Continuous Resurrection.

Faith Is That Which, Knowing The Lord's Will, Goes And Does It; Or, Not Knowing It, Stands And Waits, Content In Ignorance As In Knowledge, Because God Wills - Neither Pressing Into The Hidden Future, Nor Careless Of The Knowledge Which Opens The Path Of Action

Anything Big Enough To Occupy Our Minds Is Big Enough To Hang A Prayer On.

No Words Can Express How Much The World Owes To Sorrow. Most Of The Psalms Were Born In The Wilderness. Most Of The Epistles Were Written In A Prison. The Greatest Thoughts Of The Greatest Thinkers Have All Passed Through Fire. The Greatest Poets Have "learned In Suffering What They Taught In Song." In Bonds Bunyan Lived The Allegory That He Afterwards Wrote, And We May Thank Bedford Jail For The Pilgrim's Progress. Take Comfort, Afflicted Christian! When God Is About To Make Pre-eminent Use Of A Person, He Put Them In The Fire.

Joy Cannot Unfold The Deepest Truths. Cometh White-robed Sorrow, Stooping And Wan, And Flingeth Wide The Door She Must Not Enter.

In The Hearts Of Witches, Love And Hate Lie Close Together And Often Tumble Over Each Other.

No, There Is No Escape. There Is No Heaven With A Little Of Hell In It--no Plan To Retain This Or That Of The Devil In Our Hearts Or Our Pockets. Out Satan Must Go, Every Hair And Feather!

He (god) Can Be Revealed Only To The Child; Perfectly, To The Pure Child Only. All The Discipline Of The World Is To Make Men Children, That God May Be Revealed To Them.

It Is Our Best Work That God Wants, Not The Dregs Of Our Exhaustion. I Think He Must Prefer Quality To Quantity.

Quality Not Quantity

Faith Is Obedience, Not Compliance.

What A Good Thing, For Instance, It Was That One Princess Should Sleep For A Hundred Years! Was She Not Saved From All The Plague Of Young Men Who Were Not Worthy Of Her? And Did Not She Come Awake Exactly At The Right Moment When The Right Prince Kissed Her? For My Part, I Cannot Help Wishing A Good Many Girls Would Sleep Till Just The Same Fate Overtook Them. It Would Be Happier For Them, And More Agreeable To Their Friends.

This Is And Has Been The Father's Work From The Beginning-to Bring Us Into The Home Of His Heart.

As In All Sweetest Music, A Tinge Of Sadness Was In Every Note. Nor Do We Know How Much Of The Pleasures Even Of Life We Owe To The Intermingled Sorrows. Joy Cannot Unfold The Deepest Truths, Although Deepest Truth Must Be Deepest Joy.

When I Look Like This Into The Blue Sky, It Seems So Deep, So Peaceful, So Full Of A Mysterious Tenderness, That I Could Lie For Centuries And Wait For The Dawning Of The Face Of God Out Of The Awe-inspiring Loving-kindness.

If Those Who Had Set Themselves To Explain The Various Theories Of Christianity Had Set Themselves Instead To Do The Will Of The Master, How Different The World Would Be Now!

I Am Perplexed At The Stupidity Of The Ordinary Religious Being. In The Most Practical Of All Matters He Will Talk And Speculate And Try To Feel, But He Will Not Set Himself To Do.

Forgiveness Is The Giving, And So The Receiving, Of Life.

Every Soul Has A Landscape That Changes With The Wind That Sweeps The Sky, With The Clouds That Return After Its Rain.

A Man's Real Belief Is That Which He Lives By. What A Man Believes Is The Thing He Does, Not The Thing He Thinks.

Then The Old Man Of The Earth Stooped Over The Floor Of The Cave, Raised A Huge Stone From It, And Left It Leaning. It Disclosed A Great Hole That Went Plumb-down. "that Is The Way," He Said. "but There Are No Stairs." "you Must Throw Yourself In. There Is No Other Way.

The Mind Of The Many Is Not The Mind Of God.

In Giving, A Man Receives More Than He Gives; And The More Is In Proportion To The Worth Of The Thing Given.

But It Is Not The Rich Man Only Who Is Under The Dominion Of Things; They Too Are Slaves Who, Having No Money, Are Unhappy From The Lack Of It.

Few Delights Can Equal The Presence Of One Whom We Trust Utterly.

Annihilation Itself Is No Death To Evil. Only Good Where Evil Was, Is Evil Dead. An Evil Thing Must Live With Its Evil Until It Chooses To Be Good. That Alone Is The Slaying Of Evil.

It Is By Loving And Not By Being Loved That One Can Come Nearest To The Soul Of Another.

In Whatever Man Does Without God, He Must Fail Miserably, Or Succeed More Miserably.

Above All Things, I Delight In Listening To Stories, And Sometimes In Telling Them.

Many A Thief Is A Better Man Than Many A Clergyman, And Miles Nearer To The Gate Of The Kingdom.

But There Are Not A Few Who Would Be Indignant At Having Their Belief In God Questioned, Who Yet Seem Greatly To Fear Imagining Him Better Than He Is.

Do Not Measure God's Mind By Your Own.

Diamond, However, Had Not Been Out So Late Before In All His Life, And Things Looked So Strange About Him! - Just As If He Had Got Into Fairyland, Of Which He Knew Quite As Much As Anybody; For His Mother Had No Money To Buy Books To Set Him Wrong On The Subject.

Nothing Makes One Feel So Strong As A Call For Help.

The First Thing A Kindness Deserves Is Acceptance, The Second, Transmission.

The Miracles Of Jesus Were The Ordinary Works Of His Father, Wrought Small And Swift That We Might Take Them In.

When We Are Out Of Sympathy With The Young, Then I Think Our Work In This World Is Over

All That Man Sees Has To Do With Man. Worlds Cannot Be Without An Intermundane Relationship. The Community Of The Centre Of All Creation Suggests An Interradiating Connection And Dependence Of The Parts. Else A Grander Idea Is Conceivable Than That Which Is Already Embodied.

Some Thinkers Would Feel Sorely Hampered If At Liberty To Use No Forms But Such As Existed In Nature, Or To Invent Nothing Save In Accordance With The Laws Of The World Of The Senses; But It Must Not Therefore Be Imagined That They Desire Escape From The Region Of Law.

I Believe That No Hell Will Be Lacking Which Would Help The Just Mercy Of God To Redeem His Children.

To Say On The Authority Of The Bible That God Does A Thing No Honourable Man Would Do, Is To Lie Against God; To Say That It Is Therefore Right, Is To Lie Against The Very Spirit Of God.

The Word Doctrine, As Used In The Bible, Means Teaching Of Duty, Not Theory.

Were I Asked, What Is A Fairytale? I Should Reply, Read Undine: That Is A Fairytale.

Primarily, God Is Not Bound To Punish Sin; He Is Bound To Destroy Sin. The Only Vengeance Worth Having On Sin Is To Make The Sinner Himself Its Executioner.

It Matters Little Where A Man May Be At This Moment; The Point Is Whether He Is Growing.

Good Souls Many Will One Day Be Horrified At The Things They Now Believe Of God.

What Honest Boy Would Pride Himself On Not Picking Pockets ? A Thief Who Was Trying To Reform Would. To Be Conceited Of Doing One's Duty Is Then A Sign Of How Little One Does It, And How Little One Sees What A Contemptible Thing It Is Not To Do It. Could Any But A Low Creature Be Conceited Of Not Being Contemptible? Until Our Duty Becomes To Us Common As Breathing, We Are Poor Creatures.

The World...is Full Of Resurrections... Every Night That Folds Us Up In Darkness Is A Death; And Those Of You That Have Been Out Early, And Have Seen The First Of The Dawn, Will Know It - The Day Rises Out Of The Night Like A Being That Has Burst Its Tomb And Escaped Into Life.

Ah, What Is It We Send Up Thither, Where Our Thoughts Are Either A Dissonance Or A Sweetness And A Grace?

She Would Wonder What Had Hurt Her When She Found Her Face Wet With Tears, And Then Would Wonder How She Could Have Been Hurt Without Knowing It.

To Be Kind Neither Hurts Nor Compromises.

Truth Is A Very Different Thing From Fact; It Is The Loving Contact Of The Soul With Spiritual Fact, Vital And Potent. It Does Not Work In The Soul Independently Of All Faculty Or Qualification There For Setting It Forth Or Defending It. Truth In The Inward Parts Is A Power, Not An Opinion.

No Man Can Make Haste To Be Rich Without Going Against The Will Of God, In Which Case It Is The One Frightful Thing To Be Successful.

We Must Do The Thing We Must Before The Thing We May; We Are Unfit For Any Trust Till We Can And Do Obey.

Cleverness Is Cheap. It Is Faith That He Praises.

I Repent Me Of The Ignorance Wherein I Ever Said That God Made Man Out Of Nothing: There Is No Nothing Out Of Which To Make Anything; God Is All In All, And He Made Us Out Of Himself.

Each Is But A Means To An End; In The Perfected End We Find The Intent, And There God — Not In The Laws Themselves, Except As His Means Of Revealing Himself. For That Same Reason, Human Science Cannot Discover God. For Human Science Is But The Backward Undoing Of The Tapestry-web Of God's Science, It Works With Its Back To Him, And Is Always Leaving Him — His Intent.

It Was Foolish Indeed - Thus To Run Farther And Farther From All Who Could Help Her, As If She Had Been Seeking A Fit Spot For The Goblin Creature To Eat Her In At His Leisure; But That Is The Way Fear Serves Us: It Always Sides With The Thing We Are Afraid Of.

The Ruin Of A Man's Teaching Comes Of His Followers, Such As Having Never Touched The Foundation He Has Laid, Build Upon It Wood, Hay, And Stubble, Fit Only To Be Burnt. Therefore, If Only To Avoid His Worst Foes, His Admirers, A Man Should Avoid System. The More Correct A System The Worse Will It Be Misunderstood; Its Professed Admirers Will Take Both Its Errors And Their Misconceptions Of Its Truths, And Hold Them Forth As Its Essence.

Which Of Us Is Other Than A Secret To All But God!

But There Is A Light That Goes Deeper Than The Will, A Light That Lights Up The Darkness Behind It: That Light Can Change Your Will, Can Make It Truly Yours And Not Another's - Not The Shadow's. Into The Created Can Pour Itself The Creating Will, And So Redeem It!

The Face Of The Son Of God, Who, Instead Of Accepting The Sacrifice Of One Of His Creatures To Satisfy His Justice Or Support His Dignity, Gave Himself Utterly Unto Them, And Therein To The Father By Doing His Lovely Will; Who Suffered Unto The Death, Not That Men Might Not Suffer, But That Their Suffering Might Be Like His, And Lead Them Up To His Perfection.

Alas, How Easily Things Go Wrong! A Sigh Too Much, A Kiss Too Long And There Follows A Mist And A Weeping Rain And Life Is Never The Same Again

It Is When People Do Wrong Things Wilfully That They Are The More Likely To Do Them Again.

It Is A Happy Thing For Us That This Is Really All We Have To Concern Ourselves About--what To Do Next. No Man Can Do The Second Thing. He Can Do The First.

Remember, Then, That Whoever Does Not Mean Good Is Always In Danger Of Harm. But I Try To Give Everybody Fair Play, And Those That Are In The Wrong Are In Far More Need Of It Always Than Those Who Are In The Right: They Can Afford To Do Without It.

I Dare Not Say With Paul That I Am The Slave Of Christ, But My Highest Aspiration And Desire Is To Be The Slave Of Christ.

What Distressed Me Most - More Even Than My Own Folly - Was The Perplexing Question, How Can Beauty And Ugliness Dwell So Near?

To Judge Religion We Must Have It--not Stare At It From The Bottom Of A Seemingly Interminable Ladder.

You Doubt Because You Love Truth.

Where Did You Get Your Eyes So Blue? Out Of The Sky As I Came Through.

I Begin Indeed To Fear That I Have Undertaken An Impossibility, Undertaken To Tell What I Cannot Tell Because No Speech At My Command Will Fit The Forms In My Mind.

We Can Walk Without Fear, Full Of Hope And Courage And Strength To Do His Will, Waiting For The Endless Good Which He Is Always Giving As Fast As He Can Get Us Able To Take It In.

Alas! How Easily Things Go Wrong!

No Story Ever Really Ends, And I Think I Know Why.

Truth Is Truth, Whether From The Lips Of Jesus Or Balaam.

Ambition Is But The Evil Shadow Of Aspiration.

I Would Not Favour A Fiction To Keep A Whole World Out Of Hell. The Hell That A Lie Would Keep Any Man Out Of Is Doubtless The Very Best Place For Him To Go To. It Is Truth... That Saves The World.

What I Would Say Is This, That The Light Is Not Blinding Because God Would Hide, But Because The Truth Is Too Glorious For Our Vision.

A Man Must Learn To Love His Children, Not Because They Are His, But Because They Are Children, Else His Love Will Be Scarcely A Better Thing At Last Than The Party-spirit Of The Faithful Politician.

It Is Not The Cares Of Today, But The Cares Of Tomorrow, That Weigh A Man Down.

To Free A Man From Suffering, He Must Be Set Right, Put In Health; And The Health At The Root Of Man's Being, His Rightness, Is To Be Free From Wrongness, That Is, From Sin. A Man Is Right When There Is No Wrong In Him. I Do Not Mean Set Free From The Sins He Has Done: That Will Follow; I Mean The Sins He Is Doing, Or Is Capable Of Doing; The Sins In His Being Which Spoil His Nature — The Wrongness In Him — The Evil He Consents To; The Sin He Is, Which Makes Him Do The Sin He Does.

Man's Rank Is His Power To Uplift.

The Lord Never Came To Deliver Men From The Consequences Of Their Sins While Yet Those Sins Remained...yet Men, Loving Their Sins And Feeling Nothing Of Their Dread Hatefulness, Have, Consistent With Their Low Condition, Constantly Taken This Word Concerning The Lord To Mean That He Came To Save Them From The Punishment Of Their Sins.

It Has Been Well Said That No Man Ever Sank Under The Burden Of The Day. It Is, When Tomorrow's Burden Is Added To The Burden Of Today, That The Weight Is More Than A Man Can Bear. Never Load Yourselves So, My Friends. If You Find Yourselves So Loaded, At Least Remember This: It Is Your Own Doing, Not God's. He Begs You To Leave The Future To Him, And Mind The Present.

Her Face Was Fair And Pretty, With Eyes Like Two Bits Of Night Sky, Each With A Star Dissolved In The Blue.

The Ideal Is The Only Absolute Real; And It Must Become The Real In The Individual Life As Well, However Impossible They May Count It Who Never Tried It.

There Is No Slave But The Creature That Wills Against Its Creator.

Love Loves Unto Purity. Love Has Ever In View The Absolute Loveliness Of That Which It Beholds. Therefore All That Is Not Beautiful In The Beloved, All That Comes Between And Is Not Of Love's Kind, Must Be Destroyed. And Our God Is A Consuming Fire.

Anything Large Enough For A Wish To Light Upon, Is Large Enough To Hang A Prayer Upon.

God Chooses That Men Should Be Tried, But Let A Man Beware Of Tempting His Neighbor.

He Who Is Faithful Over A Few Things Is A Lord Of Cities. It Does Not Matter Whether You Preach In Westminster Abbey Or Teach A Ragged Class, So You Be Faithful. The Faithfulness Is All.

Suppose You Didn't Know Him, Would That Make Any Difference?' 'no,' Said Willie, After Thinking A Little. 'other People Would Know Him If I Didn't.' 'yes, And If Nobody Knew Him, God Would Know Him, And Anybody God Has Thought Worth Making, It's An Honor To Do Anything For.

To Receive Honestly Is The Best Thanks For A Good Thing.

Common People, Whether Lords Or Shop-keepers, Are Slow To Understand That Possession, Whether In The Shape Of Birth Or Lands Or Money Or Intellect, Is A Small Affair In The Difference Between Men.

God Hides Nothing. His Very Work From The Beginning Is Revelation--a Casting Aside Of Veil After Veil, A Showing Unto Men Of Truth After Truth. On And On From Fact Divine He Advances, Until At Length In His Son Jesus He Unveils His Very Face.

The Doing Of Things From Duty Is But A Stage On The Road To The Kingdom Of Truth And Love.

No One Is Likely To Remember What Is Entirely Uninteresting To Him.

If There Be A God And One Has Never Sought Him, It Will Be Small Consolation To Remember That One Could Not Get Proof Of His Existence.

If There Is A God

Division Has Done More To Hide Christ From The View Of Men Than All The Infidelity That Has Ever Been Spoken.

He May Delay Because It Would Not Be Safe To Give Us At Once What We Ask: We Are Not Ready For It. To Give Ere We Could Truly Receive, Would Be To Destroy The Very Heart And Hope Of Prayer, To Cease To Be Our Father. The Delay Itself May Work To Bring Us Nearer To Our Help, To Increase The Desire, Perfect The Prayer, And Ripen The Receptive Condition.

Let Me, If I May, Be Ever Welcomed To My Room In Winter By A Glowing Hearth, In Summer By A Vase Of Flowers. If I May Not, Let Me Think How Nice They Would Be And Bury Myself In My Work. I Do Not Think That The Road To Contentment Lies In Despising What We Have Not Got. Let Us Acknowledge All Good, All Delight That The Worlds Holds, And Be Content Without It.

What A Man Is Lies As Certainly Upon His Countenance As In His Heart, Though None Of His Acquaintances May Be Able To Read It. The Very Intercourse With Him May Have Rendered It More Difficult.

God Left The World Unfinished For Man To Work His Skill Upon. He Left The Electricity Still In The Cloud, The Oil Still In The Earth. How Often We Look Upon God As Our Last And Feeblest Resource! We Go To Him Because We Have Nowhere Else To Go. And Then We Learn That The Storms Of Life Have Driven Us, Not Upon The Rocks, But Into The Desired Haven.

But, For As Cold And Wretched As It Looks, The Sun Has Not Forsaken It. He Has Only Drawn Away From It A Little, For Good Reasons, One Of Which Is That We May Learn That We Cannot Do Without Him.

The Truly Wise Talk Little About Religion And Are Not Given To Taking Sides On Doctrinal Issues. When They Hear People Advocating Or Opposing The Claims Of This Or That Party In The Church, They Turn Away With A Smile Such As Men Yield To The Talk Of Children. They Have No Time, They Would Say, For That Kind Of Thing. They Have Enough To Do In Trying To Faithfully Practice What Is Beyond Dispute.

The Love Of Our Neighbor Is The Only Door Out Of The Dungeon Of Self.

A Man May Sink By Such Slow Degrees That, Long After He Is A Devil, He May Go On Being A Good Churchman Or A Good Dissenter And Thinking Himself A Good Christian.

Do You Think You Love Your Children Better Than He Who Made Them? Is Not Your Love What It Is Because He Put It Into Your Heart First? Have You Not Often Been Cross With Them? Sometimes Unjust To Them? Whence Came The Returning Love That Rose From Unknown Depths In Your Being, And Swept Away The Anger And The Injustice? You Did Not Create That Love. Probably You Were Not Good Enough To Send For It By Prayer. But It Came. God Sent It. He Makes You Love Your Children.

Those That Hope Little Cannot Grow Much.

Beauty And Sadness Always Go Together. Nature Thought Beauty Too Rich To Go Forth Upon The Earth Without A Meet Alloy.

God Never Gave Man A Thing To Do Concerning Which It Were Irreverent To Ponder How The Son Of God Would Have Done It.

Sad, Indeed, Would The Whole Matter Be If The Bible Had Told Us Everything God Meant Us To Believe. But Herein Is The Bible Greatly Wronged. It Nowhere Lays Claim To Be Regarded As The Word, The Way, The Truth. The Bible Leads Us To Jesus, The Inexhaustible, The Ever-unfolding Revelation Of God. It Is Christ "in Whom Are Hid All The Treasures Of Wisdom And Knowledge," Not The Bible, Save As Leading To Him.

And So All Growth That Is Not Towards God Is Growing To Decay.

The Bible Is To Me The Most Precious Thing In The World, Because It Tells Me His Story; And What Good Men Thought About Him Who Knew Him And Accepted Him.

God Himself - His Thoughts, His Will, His Love, His Judgments Are Men's Home. To Think His Thoughts, To Choose His Will, To Judge His Judgments, And Thus To Know That He Is In Us, With Us, Is To Be At Home. And To Pass Through The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death Is The Way Home, But Only Thus, That As All Changes Have Hitherto Led Us Nearer To This Home, The Knowledge Of God, So This Greatest Of All Outward Changes - For It Is But An Outward Change - Will Surely Usher Us Into A Region Where There Will Be Fresh Possibilities Of Drawing Nigh In Heart, Soul, And Mind To The Father Of Us All.

As No Scripture Is Of Private Interpretation, So Is There No Feeling In A Human Heart Which Exists In That Heart Alone - Which Is Not, In Some Form Or Degree, In Every Human Heart.

Instead Of Asking Yourself Whether You Believe Or Not, Ask Yourself Whether You Have, This Day, Done One Thing Because He Said, Do It! Or Once Abstained Because He Said, Do Not Do It! It Is Simply Absurd To Say You Believe, Or Even Want To Believe, In Him, If You Do Not Do Anything He Tells You.

My Prayers, My God, Flow From What I Am Not; I Think Thy Answers Make Me What I Am.

Let A Man Think And Care Ever So Little About God, He Does Not Therefore Exist Without God. God Is Here With Him, Upholding, Warming, Delighting, Teaching Him-making Life A Good Thing To Him. God Gives Him Himself, Though The Man Knows It Not.

One Of The Good Things That Come Of A True Marriage Is, That There Is One Face On Which Changes Come Without Your Seeing Them; Or Rather There Is One Face Which You Can Still See The Same, Through All The Shadows Which Years Have Gathered Upon It.

It Is Not The Cares Of Today, But The Cares Of Tomorrow, That Weigh A Man Down. For The Needs Of Today We Have Corresponding Strength Given. For The Morrow We Are Told To Trust. It Is Not Ours Yet. It Is When Tomorrow's Burden Is Added To The Burden Of Today That The Weight Is More Than A Man Can Bear.

[god Desires] Not That He May Say To Them, "look How Mighty I Am, And Go Down Upon Your Knees And Worship," For Power Alone Was Never Yet Worthy Of Prayer; But That He May Say Thus: "look, My Children, You Will Never Be Strong But With My Strength. I Have No Other To Give You. And That You Can Get Only By Trusting In Me. I Can Not Give It You Any Other Way. There Is No Other Way."

Forgiveness Unleashes Joy. It Brings Peace. It Washes The Slate Clean. It Sets All The Highest Values Of Love In Motion.

I Watched Her Departure, As One Watches A Sunset. She Went Like A Radiance Through The Dark Wood, Which Was Henceforth Bright To Me, From Simply Knowing That Such A Creature Was In It.

For When Is The Child The Ideal Child In Our Eyes And To Our Hearts? Is It Not When With Gentle Hand He Takes His Father By The Beard, And Turns That Father's Face Up To His Brothers And Sisters To Kiss? When Even The Lovely Selfishness Of Love-seeking Has Vanished, And The Heart Is Absorbed In Loving?

The Birds, The Poets Of The Animal Creation - What Though They Never Get Beyond The Lyrical! - Awoke To Utter Their Own Joy, And Awake Like Joy In Others Of God's Children.

Love Me, Beloved; Hades And Death Shall Vanish Away Like A Frosty Breath; These Hands, That Now Are At Home In Thine, Shall Clasp Thee Again, If Thou Art Still Mine; And Thou Shalt Be Mine, My Spirit's Bride, In The Ceaseless Flow Of Eternity's Tide, If The Truest Love Thy Heart Can Know Meet The Truest Love That From Mine Can Flow. Pray God, Beloved, For Thee And Me, That Our Sourls May Be Wedded Eternally.

It May Be Infinitely Worse To Refuse To Forgive Than To Murder, Because

Where There Is No Choice, We Do Well To Make No Difficulty.

If We Knew As Much About Heaven As God Does, We Would Clap Our Hands Every Time A Christian Dies.

...though I Cannot Promise To Take You Home," Said North Wind, As She Sank Nearer And Nearer To The Tops Of The Houses, "i Can Promise You It Will Be All Right In The End. You Will Get Home Somehow.

They Are Not The Best Students Who Are Most Dependent On Books. What Can Be Got Out Of Them Is At Best Only Material; A Man Must Build His House For Himself.

My Spirits Rose As I Went Deeper; Into The Forest; But I Could Not Regain My Former Elasticity Of Mind. I Found Cheerfulness To Be Like Life Itself - Not To Be Created By Any Argument. Afterwards I Learned, That The Best Way To Manage Some Kinds Of Pain Fill Thoughts, Is To Dare Them To Do Their Worst; To Let Them Lie And Gnaw At Your Heart Till They Are Tired; And You Find You Still Have A Residue Of Life They Cannot Kill. So, Better And Worse, I Went On, Till I Came To A Little Clearing In The Forest.

I Am Sometimes Almost Terrified At The Scope Of The Demands Made Upon Me, At The Perfection Of The Self-abandonment Required Of Me; Yet Outside Of Such Absoluteness Can Be No Salvation.

I Say Again, If I Cannot Draw A Horse, I Will Not Write This Is A Horse Under What I Foolishly Meant For One.

The Boy Should Enclose And Keep, As His Life, The Old Child At The Heart Of Him, And Never Let It Go. He Must Still, To Be A Right Man, Be His Mother's Darling, And More, His Father's Pride, And More. The Child Is Not Meant To Die, But To Be Forever Fresh Born.

But For Money And The Need Of It, There Would Not Be Half The Friendship In The World. It Is Powerful For Good If Divinely Used. Give It Plenty Of Air And It Is Sweet As The Hawthorn; Shut It Up And It Cankers And Breeds Worms.

People Must Not Choose Their Neighbors; They Must Take The Neighbors That God Sends Them. The Neighbor Is Just The Person Who Is Next To You At The Moment, The Person With Whom Any Business Has Brought You Into Contact.

Never Tell A Child 'you Have A Soul.' Teach Him, You Are A Soul; You Have A Body.

The Direst Foe Of Courage Is The Fear Itself, Not The Object Of It; And The Man Who Can Overcome His Own Terror Is A Hero And More.

Not Only Then Has Each Man His Individual Relation To God, But Each Man Has His Peculiar Relation To God.

What Does God Want Me To Do?”, Not “what Will God Do If I Do So And So?

If Both Church And Fairy-tale Belong To Humanity, They May Occasionally Cross Circles, Without Injury To Either.

Oh The Folly Of Any Mind That Would Explain God Before Obeying Him! That Would Map Out The Character Of God Instead Of Crying, Lord, What Wouldst Thou Have Me To Do?

It Is By Loving, And Not By Being Loved, That One Can Come Nearest The Soul Of Another; Yea, That, Where Two Love, It Is The Loving Of Each Other, That Originates And Perfects And Assures Their Blessedness. I Knew That Love Gives To Him That Loveth, Power Over Any Soul Beloved, Even If That Soul Know Him Not, Bringing Him Inwardly Close To That Spirit; A Power That Cannot Be But For Good; For In Proportion As Selfishness Intrudes, The Love Ceases, And The Power Which Springs Therefrom Dies. Yet All Love Will, One Day, Meet With Its Return.

Only Because Uplifted In Song, Was I Able To Endure The Blaze Of The Dawn.

Work Is Not Always Required. There Is Such A Thing As Sacred Idleness.

Meditation Practice

Moderation Is The Basis Of Justice.

Free Will Is Not The Liberty To Do Whatever One Likes, But The Power Of Doing Whatever One Sees Ought To Be Done, Even In The Very Face Of Otherwise Overwhelming Impulse. There Lies Freedom, Indeed.

All That Is Made Seems Planless To The Darkened Mind, Because There Are More Plans Than It Looked For...there Seems No Plan Because It Is All Plan: There Seems No Centre Because It Is All Centre.

One Who Not Merely Beholds The Outward Shows Of Things, But Catches A Glimpse Of The Soul That Looks Out Of Them, Whose Garment And Revelation They Are-if He Be Such, I Say, He Will Stand, For More Than A Moment, Speechless With Something Akin To That Which Made The Morning Stars Sing Together.

Well, Perhaps; But I Begin To Think There Are Better Things Than Being Comfortable.

I Only Know When I Don't Know A Thing. My Uncle Has Taught Me That Wisdom Lies In That.

Age Is Not All Decay; It Is The Ripening, The Swelling, Of The Fresh Life Within, That Withers And Bursts The Husk.

I Came From God, And I'm Going Back To God, And I Won't Have Any Gaps Of Death In The Middle Of My Life.

What God May Hereafter Require Of You, You Must Not Give Yourself The Least Trouble About. Everything He Gives You To Do, You Must Do As Well As Ever You Can, And That Is The Best Possible Preparation For What He May Want You To Do Next. If People Would But Do What They Have To Do, They Would Always Find Themselves Ready For What Came Next.

Somehow, I Can't Say How, It Tells Me That All Is Right; That It Is Coming To Swallow Up All Cries.

Until A Man Has Love, It Is Well He Should Have Fear. So Long As There Are Wild Beasts About, It Is Better To Be Afraid Than Secure.

By All Means Rid Yourself Of An Impoverished Faith.

I Write, Not For Children,but For The Child-like, Whether They Be Of Five, Or Fifty, Or Seventy-five.

Will Is Not Unfrequently Weakness.

One Of The Grandest Things In Having Rights Is, That Though They Are Your Rights You May Give Them Up

Affliction Is But The Shadow Of God's Wing.

Friends, If We Be Honest With Ourselves, We Shall Be Honest With Each Other.

Half Of The Misery In The World Comes From Trying To Look, Instead Of Trying To Be, What One Is Not.

"but If God Is So Good As You Represent Him, And If He Knows All That We Need, And Better Far Than We Do Ourselves, Why Should It Be Necessary To Ask Him For Anything?" I Answer, "what If He Knows Prayer To Be The Thing We Need First And Most? What If The Main Object In God's Idea Of Prayer Be The Supplying Of Our Great, Our Endless Need - The Need Of Himself?"

In The Midst Of Death We Are In Life. Life Is The Only Reality; What Men Call Death Is But A Shadow.

Forgiveness Is The Giving And So The Receiving Of Life. The Latter May Be An Impulse Of A Moment Of Heat; Whereas The Former Is A Cold And Deliberate Choice Of The Heart.

The Time For Speaking Seldom Arrives, The Time For Being Never Departs.

Not Even Nothingness Preceded Life. Nothingness Owes Its Very Idea To Existence.

There Is No Inborn Longing That Shall Not Be Fulfilled. I Think That Is As Certain As The Forgiveness Of Sins.

We Have To Do With God, To Whom No One Can Look Without The Need Of Being Good Waking Up In His Heart; To Think About God Is To Begin To Be Good.

I Rose As From The Death That Wipes Out The Sadness Of Life, And Then Dies Itself In The New Morrow.

Right Gladly Would He Free Them From Their Misery, But He Knows Only One Way: He Will Teach Them To Be Like Himself, Meek And Lowly, Bearing With Gladness The Yoke Of His Father's Will. This In The One, The Only Right, The Only Possible Way Of Freeing Them From Their Sin, The Cause Of Their Unrest.

I Learned That He That Will Be A Hero Will Barely Be A Man; That He That Will Be Nothing But A Doer Of His Work Is Sure Of His Manhood.

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