Quotes about Struggle

The mind commands the body and is instantly obeyed. The mind commands itself and meets resistance.

But woe is thee, thou torrent of human custom! Who shall stand against thee?

Why then be perverted and follow thy flesh? Be it converted and follow thee.

O crooked paths! Woe to the audacious soul, which hoped, by forsaking Thee, to gain some better thing! Turned it hath, and turned again, upon back, sides, and belly, yet all was painful; and Thou alone rest.

Woe, woe, by what steps was I brought down to the depths of hell! toiling and turmoiling through want of Truth, since I sought after Thee, my God (to Thee I confess it, who hadst mercy on me, not as yet confessing), not according to the understanding of the mind, wherein Thou willedst that I should excel the beasts, but according to the sense of the flesh.

The mind commands the body, and it obeys instantly; the mind commands itself, and is resisted.

But what marvel that I was thus carried away to vanities, and went out from Thy presence, O my God, when men were set before me as models.

Lord, have pity on me. My evil sorrows strive with my good joys; and on which side is the victory, I know not.

O foolish man that I then was, enduring impatiently the lot of man! I fretted then, sighed, wept, was distracted; had neither rest nor counsel. For I bore about a shattered and bleeding soul, impatient of being borne by me, yet where to repose it, I found not.

Behold with what companions I walked the streets of Babylon, and wallowed in the mire thereof, as if in a bed of spices and precious ointments. And that I might cleave the faster to its very centre, the invisible enemy trod me down, and seduced me, for that I was easy to be seduced.

Indeed, man wishes to be happy even when he so lives as to make happiness impossible.

Now, justification in this life is given to us according to these three things: first by the laver of regeneration by which all sins are forgiven; then, by a struggle with the faults from whose guilt we have been absolved; the third, when our prayer is heard, in which we say: Forgive us our debts, because however bravely we fight against our faults, we are men; but the grace of God so aids as we fight in this corruptible body that there is reason for His hearing us as we ask forgiveness.