Quote for the Night

[Shin]

'The name of Jesus, pronounced with reverence and affection, has a kind of power to soften the heart.'

St. Philip Neri

[Shin]

'Yet you are not the sole author of the evil, but there is also another most wicked prompter, the devil. He indeed suggests, but does not get the mastery by force over those who do not consent.'

St. Cyril of Jerusalem

[Shin]

'To those who wish to stand in God's grace, neither the guardianship of saints nor the defenses of angels are wanting.'

St. Hilary of Poitiers

[Shin]

'If you wish to overcome impassioned thoughts, acquire self-control and love for your neighbor.'

St. Thalassios the Libyan

[Shin]

'When a man has to buy anything, he ought not to do so because he is moved by an attachment to the thing, but from want and necessity; for it will never do to buy attachments.'

St. Philip Neri

[Shin]

'Also, it is not less necessary to keep a close guard on thoughts of the mind, since the devil sometimes puts good and holy thoughts in the mind to deceive it under the appearance of virtue, and after that, in order to show what it is, tries and assaults one strongly with the vice which is contrary to this virtue. This the enemy does in order to be able to entice the person into the ditch of desperation.'

St. Catherine of Bologna

[Shin]

'He who toils unwillingly grows poor in every way, while he who presses ahead in hope is doubly rich.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

[Shin]

'If you wish to be saved and "to come unto the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim. 2:4), endeavor always to transcend sensible things, and through hope alone to cleave to God. Then you will find principalities and powers fighting against you (cf. Eph. 6:12), deflecting you against your will and provoking you to sin. But if you prevail over them through prayer and maintain your hope, you will receive God's grace, and this will deliver you from the wrath to come.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

[Shin]

'It is a great achievement not to be attracted by things. But it is a far greater achievement to remain dispassionate in the face both of things and of the conceptual images we derive from them.'

St. Maximos the Confessor

[Shin]

'It is through our fulfilling of the commandments that the Lord makes us dispassionate; and it is through His divine teachings that He gives us the light of spiritual knowledge. All such teachings are concerned either with God, or with things visible and invisible, or else with the providence and judgment relating to them.'

St. Maximos the Confessor

[Shin]

'I have heard thy sighs, and the desires of thy heart are so pleasing to Me, that had I not instituted My divine Sacrament of love, I would do so now for love of thee, so as to have the pleasure of dwelling in thy soul and of taking My loving repose in thy heart.'

The Lord, to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

[Shin]

'He who endures distress, will be granted joys; and he who bears with unpleasant things, will not be deprived of the pleasant.'

St. Nilus of Sinai

[Shin]

'The vice of personal ownership must by all means be cut out in the monastery by the very root, so that no one may presume to give or receive anything without the command of the Abbot; nor to have anything whatever as his own, neither a book, nor a writing tablet, nor a pen, nor anything else whatsoever, since monks are allowed to have neither their bodies nor their wills in their own power. Everything that is necessary, however, they must look for from the Father of the monastery; and let it not be allowed for anyone to have anything which the Abbot did not give or permit him to have. Let all things be common to all, as it is written. And let no one call or take to himself anything as his own (cf. Acts 4:32). But if anyone should be found to indulge this most baneful vice, and, having been admonished once and again, doth not amend, let him be subjected to punishment.'

St. Benedict

[Shin]

'Every vice leads in the end to forbidden pleasure; and every virtue to spiritual blessing. Each arouses what is akin to it.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

[Shin]

'Be faithful to the practice of virtue, never willfully neglecting any occasion thereof.'

St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

[Shin]

'He who divides his time between physical work and prayer subdues his body by labor and moderates its disorderly demands; and since his soul, working together with the body, at last longs for a rest, it disposes it to prayer, as to something easier, and brings it to the work of prayer with fresh strength and zeal. For the soul finds comfort in a change of occupation and in passing from one thing to another, whereas it gets bored when occupied for long with the same thing. It becomes weary of monotony, but welcomes variety of occupations. It seems to it that, by abandoning one occupation, it is freed of all hardship, and so it comes to another with fresh strength, as though it were only now starting work.'

St. Nilus of Sinai