Harry Emerson Fosdick Quotes
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One of the most amazing things ever said on this earth is Jesus's statement: "He that is greatest among you shall be your servant." Nobody has one chance in a billion of being thought really great after a century has passed except those who have been the servants of all. That strange realist from Bethlehem knew that.
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A good sermon is an engineering operation by which a chasm is bridged so that the spiritual goods on one side-the 'unsearchable riches of Christ' - are actually transported into personal lives upon the other.
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Life is like a library owned by the author. In it are a few books which he wrote himself, but most of them were written for him.
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No one can be wrong with man and right with God.
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Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have.
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It is going to be a long, hard haul; it will require patience, courage, faith that hangs on when hope fails, if we are to tame the rude barbarity of man, so that the atomic age becomes a blessing, not a curse. There never was such a day for the Christian gospel. God help us all in these years ahead to make that gospel live in men and nations!
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No life ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined.
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No horse gets anywhere until he is harnessed. No stream or gas drives anything until it is confined. No Niagara is ever turned into light and power until it is tunneled. No life ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined.
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Bitterness imprisons life; love releases it. Bitterness paralyzes life; love empowers it. Bitterness sours life; love sweetens it. Bitterness sickens life; love heals it. Bitterness blinds life; love anoints its eyes.
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It is magnificent to grow old, if one keeps young.
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The more we know about this universe, the more mysterious it is. The old world that Job knew was marvelous enough, and his description of its wonders is among the noblest poetry of the race, but today the new science has opened to our eyes vistas of mystery that transcend in their inexplicable marvel anything the ancients ever dreamed.
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He who cannot rest, cannot work; he who cannot let go, cannot hold on; he who cannot find footing, cannot go forward.
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It is not marriage that fails; it is people that fail. All that marriage does is to show people up.
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The first question to be answered by any individual or by any social group, The real handle facing a hazardous sit - to a difficult uation, is whether the stuaton crisis is to be met as a challenge to strength or as an occasion for despair.
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Prayer opens our lives for God so his will can be done in and through us, because in true prayer we habitually put ourselves into the attitude of willingness to do whatever God wills.
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Christians are supposed not merely to endure change, nor even to profit by it, but to cause it.
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No character is ultimately tested until it has suffered.
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Every failure can be considered as a tragedy or a chance to learn something. The latter is healthier...
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The stars are not so strange as the mind that studies them, analyzes their light, and measures their distance.
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No one can get inner peace by pouncing on it.
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All altruism springs from putting yourself in the other person's place.
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It is cynicism and fear that freeze life; it is faith that thaws it out, releases it, sets it free.
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I renounce war for its consequences, for the lies it lives on and propagates, for the undying hatred it arouses, for the dictatorships it puts in place of democracy, for the starvation that stalks after it. I renounce war, and never again, directly or indirectly, will I sanction or support another.
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Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.