Browse by: Quotation Source | Entire Living Book | The Seeker | The Search
Despite the many differences that seem to exist between peoples the world over — regardless of culture, tradition, environment, or heredity — there is but one seeker, one search, and one sacred object of our desire. The celestial source of this sacred being doesn’t just live within us… we are, in fact, one with it.
All things good come to those for whom the Good is all things.
In eternity there is indeed something true and sublime. But all these times and places and occasions are now and here. God himself culminates in the present moment and will never be mortifying in the lapse of the ages. Time is but a stream I go a-fishin in. I drink at it, but when I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away but eternity remains.
This mystical perception seems to be one in which all the senses unite into one.
The darker the night, the brighter the stars. The deeper the grief, the closer is God.
A humble man is not afraid of failure. In fact he is not afraid of anything, even of himself, since perfect humility implies perfect confidence in the power of God, before Whom no other power has any meaning and for Whom there is no such thing as an obstacle.
The more a man has unity and simplicity in himself, the more things and the deeper things he understands, and that without labor, because he receives the light and understanding from above.
Heroism is the brilliant triumph of the soul over the flesh, that is to say, over fear, fear of poverty, of suffering… There is no serious piety without heroism. Heroism is the dazzling and glorious concentration of courage.
A soul also desires many kisses of the Word, so that she may be enlightened with the light of the knowledge of God. For this is the kiss of the Word, I mean the light of holy knowledge.
Whenever opposite views are held with warmth by religious-minded men, we may take it for granted there is some higher truth which embraces both. All high truth is the union of two contradictions.
Enthusiasm gives life to what is invisible.
Without courage, there cannot be truth, and without truth there can be no other virtue.
At this elevation there is no effort, no struggle.
Marvel at your Lord not only because He has made heaven and the sun, but also because He has made the ant… Consider how prudent the ant is, and consider how God has implanted in so small a body such an increasing desire for work.
The silence often of pure innocence
Persuades when speaking fails.
Everyone foolishly assumes that his clock alone tells correct time. Christians claim to possess exclusive truth. Countless varieties of Hindus insist that their sect, no matter how small and insignificant, expresses the ultimate position. Devout Muslims maintain that Koranic revelation supersedes all others. The entire world is being driven insane by this single phrase: “My religion alone is true.” O Mother, you have shown me that no clock is entirely accurate. Only the transcendent sun of knowledge remains on time. Who can make a system from Divine Mystery? But if any sincere practitioner, within whatever culture or religion, prays and meditates with great devotion and commitment to Truth alone, Your Grace will flood his mind and heart, O Mother. His particular sacred tradition will be opened and illuminated. He will reach the one goal of spiritual evolution.
The true heaven is everywhere, even in the very place where you stand and go.
Fortune does us neither good nor hurt; she only presents us the matter, and the seed, which our soul, more powerfully than she, turns and applies as she best pleases; being the sole cause and sovereign mistress of her own happy or unhappy condition.
Thank you God for this and more. We leave “open” the possibilities of an unlimited, all knowing Source to bless us with things we may not conceive of.
The truth is always the strongest argument.
If men would steadily observe realities only, and not allow themselves to be deluded, life, to compare it with such things as we know, would be like a fairy tale and the Arabian Night’s Entertainments. If we respected only what is inevitable and has a right to be, music and poetry would resound along the streets.
There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it.
Nothing is more delightful than the light of truth.
One great thought breathed into a man may regenerate him.
Time, force, and death,
Do to this body what extremes you can;
But the strong base and building of my love
Is as the very centre of the earth,
Drawing all things to it.
Love in dreams is greedy for immediate action, rapidly performed and in the sight of all. Men will even give their lives if only the ordeal does not last long but is soon over, with all looking on and applauding as though on stage. But active love is labor and fortitude, and for some people too, perhaps, a complete science.
