Ezra Taft Benson Quotes

Government by kings was first introduced into the world by the Heathens, from whom the Children of Israel copied the custom. It was the most prosperous invention the Devil ever set on foot for the promotion of idolatry

All the cunning of the devil is exercised in trying to tear us away from the word.

Science with its retorts would have put me to sleep; it was the opportunity to be ignorant that I improved. It suggested to me that there was something to be seen if one had eyes. It made a believer of me more than before. I believed that the woods were not tenantless, but choke-full of honest spirits as good as myself any day,--not an empty chamber, in which chemistry was left to work alone, but an inhabited house,--and for a few moments I enjoyed fellowship with them.

As I walked through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place, where was a den; and I laid me down in that place to sleep: and as I slept I dreamed a dream. I dreamed, and behold I saw a man clothed with rags, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own house, a book in his hand, and a great burden upon his back. I looked, and saw him open the book, and read therein; and as he read, he wept and trembled: and not being able longer to contain, he brake out with a lamentable cry; saying, 'What shall I do?'

You got to tell me the brave captain Why are the wicked so strong? How do the angels get to sleep When the devil leaves the porch light on?

Every night in sleep God takes away all your troubles to show you that you are not a mortal being; you are spirit.

When you first awaken or before drifting off to sleep, quiet your mind, lift up your heart, muse, mull over, make discoveries. Consider, conceive, create, connect, concede that it all starts within.

No man means evil but the devil, and we shall know him by his horns.

Hell is both sides of the tomb, and a devil may be respectable and wear good clothes.

The devil loves nothing better than the intolerance of reformers.

If I were the devil, one of my first aims would be to stop folk from digging into the Bible.

Those who don't feel this love pulling them like a river, those who don't drink dawn like a cup of springwater or take in sunset like a supper, those who don't want to change, let them sleep.

The search for Nirvana, like the search for Utopia or the end of history or the classless society, is ultimately a futile and dangerous one. It involves, if it does not necessitate, the sleep of reason. There is no escape from anxiety and struggle.

What is our death but a night's sleep? For as through sleep all weariness and faintness pass away and cease, and the powers of the spirit come back again, so that in the morning we arise fresh and strong and joyous; so at the Last Day we shall rise again as if we had only slept a night, and shall be fresh and strong.

Watch for the devil. When there’s a god, there’s always a legion of devils.

At first, He shook us very tenderly but now His shaking has become violent, because He has not succeeded in awakening us... God is going to shake everything in sight so that He is revealed as the only unshakable power!

That there is a Devil is a thing doubted by none but such as are under the influence of the Devil. For any to deny the being of a Devil must be from ignorance or profaneness worse than diabolical.

I say the same of humility and of all the virtues; the wiles of the devil are terrible, he will run a thousand times round hell if by so doing he can make us believe that we have a single virtue which we have not. And he is right, for such ideas are very harmful, and such imaginary virtues, when they come from this source, are never unaccompanied by vainglory; just as those which God gives are free both from this and from pride.

There are some solitary wretches who seem to have left the rest of mankind, only, as Eve left Adam, to meet the devil in private.

May God us keep From Single vision and Newton's sleep.

If we come to sleep we are His drowsy ones And if we come to wake we are in His hands If we come to weeping we are His cloud full of raindrops And if we come to laughing we are His lightning in that moment If we come to anger and battle it is the reflection of His wrath And if we come to peace and pardon it is the reflection of His love Who are we in this complicated world?

We sleep to time's hurdy-gurdy; we wake, if ever we wake, to the silence of God. And then, when we wake to the deep shores of time uncreated, then when the dazzling dark breaks over the far slopes of time, then it's time to toss things, like our reason, and our will; then it's time to break our necks for home. There are no events but thoughts and the heart's hard turning, the heart's slow learning where to love and whom. The rest is merely gossip, and tales for other times.

Satan stations more devils on monastery walls than in the dens of iniquity, for the latter offer no resistance.

If you look at the life of Jesus, that's an example of true worship. You know look at the stories, if you want to learn about real worship read Matthew through John. Seriously. You just read it and you will see the true level. You see when Jesus is in the boat and the storm comes when it comes and the winds are blowing and Jesus is sleeping in the boat and the disciples are freaking out. And Jesus wakes up and says "What you guys got is a problem, no?" and he commands the seas to be calm that's true worship.