Francois Fenelon Quotes - Page 2

Above all, live in the present moment and God will give you all the grace you need.

Nothing will make us so charitable and tender to the faults of others, as, by self-examination, thoroughly to know our own.

How different the peace of God from that of the world! It calms the passions, preserves the purity of the conscience, is inseparable from righteousness, unites us to God and strengthens us against temptations. The peace of the soul consists in an absolute resignation to the will of God.

Carefully purify your conscience from daily faults; suffer no sin to dwell in your heart; small as it may seem, it obscures the light of grace, weighs down the soul, and hinders that constant communion with Jesus Christ which it should be your pleasure to cultivate.

Can we be unsafe where God has placed us, and where He watches over us as a parent a child that he loves?

Simplicity is that grace which frees the soul from all unnecessary reflections upon itself.

That love of self, which the world advocates, is a thousand times more dangerous than any poison.

Let us pray God that He would root out of our hearts every thing of our own planting, and set out there, with His own hands, the tree of life, bearing all manner of fruits.

All wars are civil wars, because all men are brothers.

Discouragement is simply the despair of wounded self-love.

Faith is letting down our nets into the transparent deeps at the Divine command, not knowing what we shall draw.

The Christian life is a long and continual tendency of our hearts toward that eternal goodness which we desire on earth. All our happiness consists in thirsting for it. Now this thirst is prayer. Ever desire to approach your Creator, and you will never cease to pray. Do not think it necessary to pronounce many words.

Nothing is so costly as the pursuit of a cure for imaginary ills.

Be content with doing calmly the little which depends upon yourself, and let all else be to you as if it were not.

God is so good that He only awaits our desire to overwhelm us with the gift of himself.

The most essential point is lowliness.

The realization of God's presence is the one sovereign remedy against temptation.

Trouble and perplexity drive me to prayer, and prayer drives away perplexity and trouble.

There is no true and constant gentleness without humility. While we are so fond of ourselves, we are easily offended with others. Let us be persuaded that nothing is due to us, and then nothing will disturb us. Let us often think of our own infirmities, and we will become indulgent towards those of others.

Of all the duties enjoined by Christianity none is more essential and yet more neglected than prayer.

We may be sure that it is the love of God only that can make us come out of self. If His powerful hand did not sustain us, we should not know how to take the first step in that direction.

Listen less to your own thoughts and more to God's thoughts.

We must have faith during the period of our grief. We think that our afflictions will be greater than we can bear, but we do not know the strength of our own hearts, nor the power of God. He knows all. He knows every folding of the heart and also the extent of the sorrow that he inflicts. What we think will overwhelm us entirely only subdues and conquers our pride. Our renewed spirit rises from its subjugation with a celestial strength and consolation.

Never let us be discouraged with ourselves. It is not when we are conscious of our faults that we are the most wicked; on the contrary, we are less so. We see by a brighter light; and let us remember for our consolation, that we never perceive our sins till we begin to cure them.

There is but one way in which God should be loved, and that is to take no step except with Him and for Him, and to follow with a generous self-abandonment every thing which He requires.