Francis de Sales Quotes

Purity and simplicity are the two wings with which man soars above the earth and all temporary nature.

The more quickly we loosen our grip on the things of the world the more firmly we can take hold of the things of eternity.

A man ought to live in this world like a lotus leaf, which grows in water but is never moistened by water; so a man ought to live in the world - his heart to God and his hands to work.

Those who think to reach God by running away from the world, when and where do they expect to meet him? We are reaching him here in this very spot, now at this very moment.

Let me love Thee so that the honour, riches, and pleasures of the world may seem unworthy even of hatred - may not even be encumbrances.

He who would be serene and pure needs but one thing, detachment.

People suffer because they are caught in their views. As soon as we release those views, we are free and we don't suffer anymore.

The truth is that you can only come to know God when you give up the past and the future in your mind and merge totally into the now, because God is always here now.

One thing I like about Zen. It doesn't believe in achievement.

So then put away, relentlessly away, all thought of the results. You cannot control them.

Think of God; attachments will gradually drop away. If you wait till all desires disappear before starting your devotion and prayer, you will have to wait for a very long time indeed.

The longer I live, the more I feel that true repose consists in 'renouncing' one's own self, by which I mean making up one's mind to admit that there is no importance whatever in being 'happy' or 'unhappy' in the usual meaning of the words.

We must be able to appreciate and enjoy the places where we tarry and yet pass on without anguish when we are called elsewhere. In our spiritual development we are often required to pull up roots many times and to close many chapters in our lives until we are no longer attached to any material thing and can love all people without any attachment to them.

He who climbs above the cares of this world, and turns his face to his God, has found the sunny side of life.

The higher goal of spiritual living is not to amass a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments.

Feel nothing, know nothing, do nothing, have nothing, give up all to God, and say utterly, 'Thy will be done.' We only dream this bondage. Wake up and let it go.

Let go of this world and take hold of God with both hands.

Only in love can I find you, my God. In love the gates of my soul spring open, allowing me to breathe a new air of freedom and forget my own petty self. In love my whole being streams forth out of the rigid confines of narrowness and anxious self-assertion, which make me a prisoner of my own poverty emptiness. In love all the powers of my soul flow out toward you, wanting never more to return, but to lose themselves completely in you, since by your love you are the inmost center of my heart, closer to me than I am to myself.

To pine for an alternative past is a waste of energy. In the pristine world of your infinite spiritual self, there is no sin or negative energy. There is only compassion, learning, and unconditional love and forgiveness. Remind yourself and those around you of this fact. In the light of God, everything is healed and seen to be perfect.

Don't be attached to the things of the world, and don't be attached to the things of the other world, because things are things. It makes no difference whether they are of this world or the other world - attachment is the problem.

God is not found in the soul by adding anything but by a process of subtraction.

It is a fair trade and an equal exchange: to the extent that you depart from things, thus far, no more and no less, God enters into you with all that is his, as far as you have stripped yourself of yourself in all things. It is here that you should begin, whatever the cost, for it is here that you will find true peace, and nowhere else.

To give up the world is to forget the ego, to know it not at all - living in the body, but not of it.

The heart that knows God can find God anywhere.

May our prayers today, and every day, be from our hearts and with the focus of our whole being.