Grace is necessary to salvation, free will equally so – but grace in order to give salvation, free will in order to receive it.
It was love that motivated His self-emptying, that led Him to become a little lower than angels, to be subject to parents, to bow His head beneath the Baptist’s hands, to endure the weakness of the flesh, and to submit to death even upon the cross.
Let your prayer for temporal blessings be strictly limited to things absolutely necessary.
Your actions in passing, pass not away, for every good work is a grain of seed for eternal life.
What I know of the divine sciences and Holy Scriptures, I learned in woods and fields. I have no other masters than the beeches and the oaks.
He rightly reads scripture who turns words into deeds.
Let no one believe that he has received the divine kiss, if he knows the truth without loving it or loves it without understanding it. But blessed is that kiss whereby not only is God recognized but also the Father is loved; for there is never full knowledge without perfect love.
All things are possible to one who believes.
The peacemakers shall be called the sons of God, who came to make peace between God and man. What then shall the sowers of discord be called, but the children of the devil? And what must they look for but their father’s portion?
When God forgives a sinner who humbly confesses his sin, the devil loses his dominion over the heart he had taken.
True love does not demand a reward, but it deserves one.
Inordinate love for the flesh is cruelty, because under the appearance of pleasing the body, we kill the soul.
Therefore gird yourselves manfully and take up joyful arms for the name of God.
He won me over entirely by giving Himself entirely to me.
You wish to see; listen. Hearing is a step toward Vision.
Who loves me will love my dog also.
Death is the gate of life.
True penance consists in regretting without ceasing the faults of the past, and in firmly resolving to never again commit that which is so deplorable.
The spiteful tongue strikes a deadly blow at charity in all who hear him speak and, so far as it can, destroys root and branch, not only in the immediate hearers but also in all others to whom the slander, flying from lip to lip, is afterwards repeated.
Pride only, the chief of all iniquities, can make us treat gifts as if they were rightful attributes of our nature, and, while receiving benefits, rob our Benefactor of His due glory.