Quotes about Reflection

He who neglects to pray alone and in private, however assiduously he frequents public meetings, there gives his prayers to the wind.

He who has learned to look to God in everything he does is at the same time diverted from all vain thoughts.

Therefore, in reading profane authors, the admirable light of truth displayed in them should remind us, that the human mind, however much fallen and perverted from its original integrity, is still adorned and invested with admirable gifts from its Creator. If we reflect that the Spirit of God is the only fountain of truth, we will be careful, as we would avoid offering insult to him, not to reject or condemn truth wherever it appears. In despising the gifts, we insult the Giver.

Men in prayer give greater license to their unlawful desires than if they were telling jocular tales among their equals.

Would the Lord have dressed the flowers with a beauty that runs freely to meet our eyes if it were wrong to be moved by such beauty? Would He have endowed them with so sweet a fragrance that flows freely into our nostrils if it were wrong to be moved by the pleasantness of such fragrance?

It is a beastly business when people start eating without prayer, and when they are full, they run out without as much as mentioning God's name.

We unlearn the art of speaking well when we cease to speak with God.

As a consequence, we must infer that man is never sufficiently touched and affected by the awareness of his lowly state until he has compared himself with God's majesty.

On the other hand, it is evident that man never attains to a true self-knowledge until he have previously contemplated the face of God, and come down after such contemplation to look into himself.

We see how mankind, without well thinking what they are doing, pursue, with impetuous and   ardent affections, the transitory things of this world; but, in thus catching at the empty shadow of a happy life, they lose true happiness itself.

Man is endowed with a singular excellence, for God formed him in his own image and likeness, in which we see a bright refulgence of God's glory.

But we must always come back to this consolation: The Lord planned our sorrow, so let us submit to his will. Even in the throes of grief, groans, and tears, we must encourage ourselves with this reflection, so that our hearts may cheerfully bear up while the storms pass over our heads (John 21:18).