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The honors of this world, what are they but puff, and emptiness, and peril of falling?
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To seek the highest good is to live well.
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Not all, nor even a majority, are saved. . . They are indeed many, if regarded by themselves, but they are few in comparison with the far larger number of those who shall be punished with the devil.
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If bodies please thee, praise God on occasion of them, and turn back thy love upon their Maker; lest in these things which please thee, thou displease. If souls please thee, be they loved in God: for they too are mutable, but in Him they are firmly established.
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I had a clear idea about what time is till I was asked to explain it and ceased to understand it altogether as soon as I began explaining it.
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We do not sin when we adore Christ in the Eucharist; we do sin when we do not adore Christ in the Eucharist.
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Let us understand that God is a physician, and that suffering is a medicine for salvation, not a punishment for damnation.
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Though there are very many nations all over the earth, ...there are no more than two kinds of human society, which we may justly call two cities, ...one consisting of those who live according to man, the other of those who live according to God ....To the City of Man belong the enemies of God, ...so inflamed with hatred against the City of God.
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When I am completely united to You, there will be no more sorrow or trials; entirely full of You, my life will be complete.
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Let your old age be childlike, and your childhood like old age; that is, so that neither may your wisdom be with pride, nor your humility without wisdom.
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He who loves the coming of the Lord is not he who affirms that it is far off, nor is it he who says it is near, but rather he who, whether it be far off or near, awaits it with sincere faith, steadfast hope, and fervent love.
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If you lose your soul, there is a danger of its being destroyed. Therefore, you may not love it, since you do not want it to be destroyed. But in not wanting it to be destroyed, you love it.
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We are certainly in a common class with the beasts; every action of animal life is concerned with seeking bodily pleasure and avoiding pain.
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What is reprehensible is that while leading good lives themselves and abhorring those of wicked men, some, fearing to offend, shut their eyes to evil deeds instead of condemning them and pointing out their malice.
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Order your soul; reduce your wants; live in charity; associate in Christian community; obey the laws; trust in Providence.
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I thought that continence was a matter of our own strength, and I knew that I had not the strength: for in my utter foolishness I did not know the word of Your Scripture that none can be continent unless You give it.
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For if it is not lawful to take the law into our own hands and slay even a guilty person, whose death no public sentence has warranted. Then certainly he who kills himself is a homicide, and so much the guiltier of his own death as he was more innocent of that offence for which he doomed himself to die.
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Conscience and reputation are two things. Conscience is due to yourself, reputation to your neighbour.
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"Otherwise grace is no more grace," since it is bestowed on us, not because we have done good works, but that we may be able to do them.
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I was in misery, and misery is the state of every soul overcome by friendship with mortal things and lacerated when they are lost. Then the soul becomes aware of the misery which is its actual condition even before it loses them.
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Too late came I to love you, O Beauty both so ancient and so new! Too late came I to love you - and behold you were with me all the time . . .
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If a parricide is more wicked than anyone who commits homicide-because he kills not merely a man but a near relative-without doubt worse still is he who kills himself, because there is none nearer to a man than himself.
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Thou hast created us for Thyself, and our heart is not quiet until it rests in Thee.
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The peace of the celestial city is the perfectly ordered and harmonious enjoyment of God, and of one another in God. (City of God, Book 19)