Skip to content

By religion I do not mean outward things, but inward states, I mean perfected manhood. I mean the quickening of the soul by the beatific influence of the divine Spirit in truth, and love, and sympathy, and confidence, and trust.

— Henry Ward Beecher

Another quote →

Topics

Religion

More quotes by Henry Ward Beecher

The call to religion is not a call to be better than your fellows, but to be better than yourself.

Life Thoughts (1858)

When laws, customs, or institutions cease to be beneficial to man, they cease to be obligatory.

Life Thoughts (1858)

He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game.

Lectures to Young Men (1844)

Flowers are the sweetest things that God ever made, and forgot to put a soul into.

Life Thoughts (1858)

There is no such thing as preaching patience into people, unless the sermon is so long that they have to practise it while they hear.

Life Thoughts (1858)

All Henry Ward Beecher quotes →

You may also like

All religions, arts and sciences are branches of the same tree. All these aspirations are directed toward ennobling man's life, lifting it from the sphere of mere physical existence and leading the individual towards freedom.

Albert Einstein Moral Decay (1937)

Science and religion are two human enterprises sharing many features.

Freeman Dyson Infinite in All Directions (1988)

The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.

John Adams A Defence of the Constitutions of Government (1787)

The Puritan hated bear-baiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators.

Thomas Babington Macaulay History of England (1849)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Henry Ward Beecher (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.