John Calvin Quotes
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We are surrounded by God’s benefits. The best use of these benefits is an unceasing expression of gratitude.
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In forming an estimate of sins, we are often imposed upon by imagining that the more hidden the less heinous they are.
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Our true wisdom is to embrace with meek docility, and without reservation, whatever the holy scriptures have delivered.
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Nothing is more dangerous than to be blinded by prosperity.
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The Fanaticism which discards the Scripture, under the pretense of resorting to immediate revelations is subversive of every principle of Christianity. For when they boast extravagantly of the Spirit, the tendency is always to bury the Word of God so they may make room for their own falsehoods.
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I gave up all for Christ, and what have I found? Everything in Christ.
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When God designs to forgive us he changes our hearts and turns us to obedience by His Spirit.
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The Eucharist is the Sacrament of Love; It signifies Love, It produces love. The Eucharist is the consummation of the whole spiritual life.
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We are not to reflect on the wickedness of men but to look to the image of God in them, an image which, covering and obliterating their faults, an image which, by its beauty and dignity, should allure us to love and embrace them.
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Christ's intercession is the continual application of his death to our salvation.
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Unless God's Word illumine the way, the whole life of men is wrapped in darkness and mist, so that they cannot but miserably stray.
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There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in this world that is not intended to make us rejoice.
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Scripture is like a pair of spectacles which dispels the darkness and gives us a clear view of God.
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When we hear any mention of our mystical union with Christ, we should remember that holiness is the channel to do it.
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Free will is an empty term.
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Without knowledge of self there is no knowledge of God Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other.
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There is nothing in afflictions which ought to disturb our joy.
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All men were created to busy themselves with the labor for the common good.
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For even if the Word in His immeasurable essence united with the nature of man into one person, we do not imagine that He was confined therein. Here is something marvellous: the Son of God descended from heaven in such a way that, without leaving heaven, He willed to be borne in the virgin's womb, to go about the earth, and to hang upon the cross; yet He continuously filled the world even as He had done from the beginning.
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Faith is God's work within us.
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It having been said above that God bends all the reprobate, and even Satan himself, at his will, three objections are started. First, that this happens by the permission, not by the will of God. To this objection there is a twofold reply, the one, that angels and men, good and bad, do nothing but what is appointed by God; the second, that all movements are secretly directed to their end by the hidden inspiration of God.
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The first part of a good work is the will, the second is vigorous effort in the doing of it. God is the author of both. It is, therefore, robbery from God to arrogate anything to ourselves, either in the will or the act.
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Without the Gospel everything is useless and vain.
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The fact that the evil ones, as long as they live, can be corrected from their errors does not prohibit that they may be justly executed, for the danger which threatens from their way of life is greater and more certain than the good which may be expected from their improvement.