82 quotes
Because as the sun reflecting upon the wind of strands and shores is unpolluted in its beams, so is God not dishonored when we suppose him in every of his creatures, and in every part of every one of them.
Holy Living (1650)
In self-examination, take no account of yourself by your thoughts and resolutions in the days of religion and solemnity; examine how it is with you in the days of ordinary conversation and in the circumstances of secular employment.
Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)
The thing framed says that nothing framed it; the tongue never made itself to speak, and yet talks against him that did; saying that which is made, is, and that which made it, is not. But this folly is infinite as hell, as much without light or bound as the chaos or the primitive nothing.
Is it possible for any man to contrive a way to make the Decree of the Council of Trent, commanding the public Offices of the Church to be in Latin, friends with the fourteenth chapter of the Corinthians?
Θεολογία Εκλεκτική: Of the Liberty of Prophesying (1647)
This grace (purity of intention) is so excellent that it sanctifies the most common actions of our life and yet is so necessary that without it, the very best actions of our devotion are imperfect and vicious.
Holy Living (1650)
We should carry up our affections to the mansions prepared for us above, where eternity is the measure, felicity the state, angels the company, the Lamb the light, and God the inheritance and portion of His people forever.
The mere doctrines and opinions of men are things Spiritual, and therefore not Cognoscible by a temporal Authority; and the Ecclesiastical Authority, which is to take Cognisance is itself so Spiritual, that it cannot inflict any punishment corporal.
Θεολογία Εκλεκτική: Of the Liberty of Prophesying (1647)
If any man be well grown in grace, he must needs come [to receive the Eucharist], because he is excellently disposed to so holy a feast: but he that is but in the infancy of piety had need to come, that so he may grow in grace. The strong must come lest they become weak; and the weak that they may become strong. The sick must come to be cured; the healthful to be preserved.
Holy Living (1650)
We are bound to follow because we judge it true, not because the Church hath said it, and this is to judge of the Church by her Doctrine, not of the Doctrine by the Church. And indeed it is the best and only way.
Θεολογία Εκλεκτική: Of the Liberty of Prophesying (1647)
Thus Nero went up and down Greece and challenged the fiddlers at their trade. Æropus, a Macedonian king, made lanterns; Harcatius, the king of Parthia, was a mole-catcher; and Biantes, the Lydian, filed needles.
O let Thy mercy descend upon the whole church; preserve her in truth and peace, in unity and safety, in all storms, and against all temptations and enemies; that she, offering to Thy glory the never-ceasing sacrifice of prayer and thanksgiving, may advance the honour of her Lord, and be filled with His Spirit, and partake of His glory. Amen.
Holy Living (1650)
When men think every thing to be their Faith and their Religion, commonly they are so busy in trifles and such impertinencies in which the scene of their mistake lies, that they neglect the greater things of the Law, charity, and compliances, and the gentleness of Christian Communion; for this is the great principle of mischief, and yet is not more pernicious then unreasonable.
Θεολογία Εκλεκτική: Of the Liberty of Prophesying (1647)
Virtue and vice are oftentimes so near neighbours that we pass into each other’s borders without observation, and think we do justice when we are cruel; or call ourselves liberal when we are loose and foolish in expenses; and are amorous when we commend our own civilities and good nature.
Holy Dying (1651)
And what can be greater than that from the goodness and love of God we receive Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost, and adoption, and the inheritance of sons, and to be coheirs with Jesus, and to have pardon of our sins, and a Divine nature, and restraining grace and the grace of sanctification, and rest and peace within us, and a certain expectation of glory?
Holy Dying (1651)
O holy and ever-blessed Spirit, Who didst overshadow the holy Virgin, the mother of our Lord, and caused her to conceive by a miraculous and mysterious manner, be pleased to overshadow my soul, and enlighten my spirit, that I may conceive the holy Jesus in my heart, and may bear Him in my mind, and may grow up to the fulness of the stature of Christ, to be a perfect man in Christ Jesus. Amen.
Holy Living (1650)
God is everywhere present by His power. He rolls the orbs of heaven with His hand; He fixes the earth with His foot; He guides all creatures with His eye, and refreshes them with His influence; He makes the powers of hell to shake with His terrors, and binds the devils with His word.
Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895)
Remember that zeal, being an excrescence of divine love, must in no sense contradict any action of love. Love to God includes love to our neighbour; and therefore no pretence of zeal for God’s glory must make us uncharitable to our brother; for that is just so pleasing to God as hatred is an act of love.
Holy Living (1650)
The way to judge of religion is by doing our duty; and theology is rather a Divine life than a Divine knowledge. In heaven, indeed, we must first see, and then love; but here, on earth, we must first love, and love will open our eyes as well as our hearts; and we shall then, see and perceive, and understand.
Easiness of desire is a great enemy to the success of a good man's prayer. Our prayers upbraid our spirits when we beg tamely for those things for which we ought to die; which are more precious than imperial sceptres, richer than the spoils of the sea or the treasures of Indian hills.
O most gracious and eternal God and loving Father, Who hast poured out Thy bowels upon us, and sent the Son of Thy love unto us to die for love, and to make us dwell in love, and the eternal comprehensions of Thy Divine mercies, O be pleased to inflame my heart with a holy charity towards Thee and all the world.
Holy Dying (1651)