Thursday, May 05, 2005

Quotes from "Thoughts in Solitude" by Thomas Merton

Temprament does not predispose one man to sanctity and another man to reprobation. All tempraments can serve as the material for ruin or salvation (9)

The things that we love tell us what we are (10)

It is the lack of self-denial and self-discipline that explains the mediocrity of so much devotional art, so much pious writing, so much sentimental writing, so many religious lives (14)

Laziness and cowardice are the two greatest enemies of the spiritual life...laziness and cowardice put our own present before the love of God. They fear the uncertainty of the future because they place no trust in God...cowardice keeps us double-minded--hesitating between the world and God. (23)

We do not find Him (God) merely by finding our own being (71)

A man knows he has found his vocation when he begins to stop thinking about how to live and begins to live (84)

The martyr is a man who has made a decision strong enough to be proved by death (102)

Those who live with God also live for Him, but they do not live in what they do for Him, they live in what they arebefore Him. (117)

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