I find that the best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice.

War is the father and king of all, and has produced some as gods and some as men, and has made some slaves and some free.

You must not murder. (Exodus 20:13) Q. What does this mean? A. We should fear and love God so that we may not hurt or harm our neighbor in his body, but help and befriend him in every bodily need [in every need and danger of life and body.

Tolerance and apathy are the last virtues of a dying society.

For anyone who is alone, without God and without a master, the weight of days is dreadful. Hence one must choose a master, God being out of style.

What wilt thou? 20:21 (KJV) Asked of the mother of the sons of Zebedee, who answered that she wanted one son to sit on Jesus's left hand and one on his right.

The whole business of the kingly weaving is comprised in this and this alone: in never allowing the self-restrained characters to be separated from the courageous, but in weaving them together by common beliefs and honors and dishonors and opinions and interchanges of pledges, thus making of them a smooth and, as we say, well-woven fabric, and then entrusting to them in common forever the offices of the state.

Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Matthew 6:26 (NKJV)

I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. 15:24 (KJV)

Habit is a second nature.

That body is heavier than another which, in an equal bulk, moves downward quicker.

Hypocrisy is a universal phenomenon. It ends with death, but not before.

Corpses are more fit to be cast out than dung.

Knowledge is the conformity of the object and the intellect.

And that servant, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. Luke 12:47 (KJV)

When speaking of the spiritual nature or the soul, we are referring to that which is "inner" or "new." When speaking of the bodily nature, or that which is flesh and blood, we are referring to that which is called "sensual," "outward," or "old." Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 4:16: "Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day."

What once sprung from earth sinks back into the earth.

Who then to frail mortality shall trust But limns the water, or but writes in dust.

Perception and knowledge could never be the same.

What would you say of that man who was made king by the error of the people, if he had so far forgotten his natural condition as to imagine that this kingdom was due to him, that he deserved it, and that it belonged to him of right? You would marvel at his stupidity and folly. But is there less in the people of rank who live in so strange a forgetfulness of their natural condition?

Ten years on the moon could tell us more about the universe than a thousand years on the earth might be able to.

You can live, provided you live; that is, you can live for ever, provided you live a good life.

A wise man never loses anything, if he has himself.

Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. 19:4-6 (KJV)

My Lord St. Albans said that Nature did never put her precious jewels into a garret four stories high, and therefore that exceeding tall men had ever very empty heads.

A doubtful balance is made between truth and pleasure, and... the knowledge of one and the feeling of the other stir up a combat the success of which is very uncertain, since, in order to judge of it, it would be necessary to know all that passes in the innermost spirit of the man, of which man himself is scarcely ever conscious.

A fate is not a punishment.

I have worked for this restlessness oriented toward inward deepening. But without authority. Instead of conceitedly making myself out to be a witness for the truth and causing others rashly to want to be the same, I am an unauthorized poet who influences by means of the ideas.

A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

The many are mean; only the few are noble.

Be bold to look towards God and say, "Use me henceforward for whatever you want; I am of one mind with you; I am yours; I refuse nothing that seems good to you; lead me where you will; wrap me in what clothes you will."

The method of not erring is sought by all the world. The logicians profess to guide it, the geometricians alone attain it, and apart from science, and the imitations of it, there are no true demonstrations.

In this life it is necessary that we be on our guard. To begin with we must be constantly aware of the fact that life here below is best described as being a type of continual warfare. This is a fact that Job, that undefeated soldier of vast experience, tells us so plainly. Yet in this matter the great majority of mankind is often deceived, for the world, like some deceitful magician, captivates their minds with seductive blandishments, and as a result most individuals behave as if there had been a cessation of hostilities.

Behold a God more powerful than I who comes to rule over me.

We are He, since we are His body and since He was made man in order to be our Head.

In Oran, as elsewhere, for want of time and thought, people have to love one another without knowing it.

Will is to grace as the horse is to the rider.

Kings and philosophers shit, and so do ladies.

Virtue (or the man of virtue) is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will have neighbors.

For the inquisition of Final Causes is barren, and like a virgin consecrated to God produces nothing.

Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.

It seemed to him [Euphemius] it would be a brilliant notion to call in an outside force to fight on his behalf. This same brilliant notion has occurred to participants in civil wars uncounted times in history and it has ended in catastrophe just about every time, since those called in invariably take over for themselves. Of all history's lessons, this seems to be the plainest, and the most frequently ignored.

T is so much to be a king, that he only is so by being so. The strange lustre that surrounds him conceals and shrouds him from us; our sight is there broken and dissipated, being stopped and filled by the prevailing light.

The world evades us because it becomes itself again. That stage scenery masked by habit becomes what it is. It withdraws at a distance from us.

Amongst so many borrowed things, I am glad if I can steal one, disguising and altering it for some new service.

Earnest in practicing the ordinary virtues, and careful in speaking about them, if, in his practice, he has anything defective, the superior man dares not but exert himself; and if, in his words, he has any excess, he dares not allow himself such license. Thus his words have respect to his actions, and his actions have respect to his words; is it not just an entire sincerity which marks the superior man?

There was no denying that he would always be conscious of the fact that an Earthman was an Earthman. He couldn't help that. That was the result of a childhood immersed in an atmosphere of bigotry so complete that it was almost invisible, so entire that you accepted its axioms as second nature. Then you left it and saw it for what it was when you looked back.

Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Honour thy father and thy mother: and, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 19:18-19 (KJV)

And happiness is thought to depend on leisure; for we are busy that we may have leisure, and make war that we may live in peace.

He that defers his charity 'till he is dead, is (if a man weighs it rightly) rather liberal of another man's, than of his own.