47 quotes
It may be impossible for a man by merely willing it to add wings to his body, but it is possible for any man, by merely willing it, to add wings to his soul. This perennial miracle of the moral nature is capable of happening at any time.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Throw yourself into the stream of the world's good tendency and you will feel the force of the current and the direction in which it is setting.
Life and Destiny (1913)
There is a difficulty in the way of teaching the higher life, due to the fact that only those who have begun to lead it can understand the meaning of it.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Let us learn from the lips of death the lessons of life. Let us live truly while we live, live for what is true and good and lasting.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The Infinite, from which comes the impulse that lead us to activity, is not the highest Reason, but higher than reason; not the highest Goodness, but higher than goodness.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The ethical element of religion has ever been its truly vital and quickening force.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The consolations of the moral ideal are vigorous. They do not encourage idle sentiment. They recommend to the sufferer action.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Ethical religion can be real only to those who are engaged in ceaseless efforts at moral improvement. By moving upward we acquire faith in an upward movement, without limit.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The moral order never is, but is ever becoming. It grows with our growth.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The frontier of the higher life is everywhere contiguous to the common life, and we can cross the border at any moment. The higher life is as real as the grosser things in which we put our trust. But our eyes must be anointed so that we may see it.
Life and Destiny (1913)
In order to join vigorously in the moral work of the world I must believe that somehow the best I can accomplish will endure, will leave its trace on things, will aid the final consummation.
Life and Destiny (1913)
We should teach our children nothing which they shall ever need to unlearn; we should strive to transmit to them the best possessions, the truest thought, the noblest sentiments of the age in which we live.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Man is like a tree, with the mighty trunk of intellect, the spreading branches of imagination, and the roots of the lower instincts that bind him to the earth. The moral life, however, is the fruit he bears; in it his true nature is revealed.
Life and Destiny (1913)
It is the business of the preacher, not only to state moral truths, but to inspire his hearers with a realising sense of their value, and to awaken in them the desire to act accordingly.
Life and Destiny (1913)
We seek to become morally certain — that is, certain for moral purposes — of what is beyond the reach of demonstration. But our moral optimism must include the darkest facts that pessimism can point to, include them and transcend them.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Religion is not necessarily allied with dogma, a new kind of faith is possible, based not upon legend and tradition, not upon the authority of any book, but upon the moral nature of man.
Life and Destiny (1913)
It is the moral element contained in it that alone gives value and dignity to a religion, and only in so far as its teachings serve to stimulate and purify our moral aspirations does it deserve to retain its ascendency over mankind.
Life and Destiny (1913)
As the light of morning strikes now one peak and then another, some being illuminated while others are in the shadow, so the light of the essential moral principle shines now upon one duty and then upon another, while others are in the shadow.
Life and Destiny (1913)
The right for the right's sake is the motto which everyone should take for his own life. With that as a standard of value we can descend into our hearts, appraise ourselves, and determine in how far we already are moral beings, in how far not yet.
Life and Destiny (1913)
Religion is a wizard, a sibyl. She faces the wreck of worlds, and prophesies restoration. She faces a sky blood-red with sunset colours that deepen into darkness, and prophesies dawn. She faces death, and prophesies life.
Life and Destiny (1913)