Quotes about Understanding

Wisdom is oftentimes nearer when we stoop than when we soar.

He who stands most remote from his age is he who mirrors it best.

You are not alone. You are seen. I am with you. You are not alone.

We are reminded that anger doesn't solve anything. It builds nothing, but it can destroy everything.

Anger does a man more hurt than that which made him angry.

Anger itself does more harm than the condition which aroused anger.

When I am angry I can write, pray, and preach well, for then my whole temperament is quickened, my understanding sharpened, and all mundane vexations and temptations depart.

With malice towards none; with charity for all.

The full potentialities of human fury cannot be reached until a friend of both parties tactfully intervenes.

A lifetime's knowledge shimmers on the face of the land in the mind of a person who knows. The history of a place is the mind of an old man or an old woman who knows it.

It is useless to try to adjudicate a long-standing animosity by asking who started it or who is the most wrong. The only sufficient answer is to give up the animosity and try forgiveness, to try to love our enemies and to talk to them and (if we pray) to pray for them. If we can't do any of that, then we must begin again by trying to imagine our enemies' children who, like our children, are in mortal danger because of enmity that they did not cause.

The significance - and ultimately the quality - of the work we do is determined by our understanding of the story in which we are taking part.