Robert Louis Stevenson Quotes

When you're surrounded by majestic Norwegian nature, it's very easy to start thinking about stuff you don't have time to in everyday life.

Give me the clear blue sky over my head, and the green turf beneath my feet, a winding road before me, and a three hours' march to dinner - and then to thinking! ... I begin to feel, think, and be myself again. Instead of an awkward silence, broken by attempts at wit or dull common-places, mine is that undisturbed silence of the heart which alone is perfect eloquence.

Prayer is a thought, a belief, a feeling, arising within the mind of the one praying.

Music has always taken me to my 'thinking place' - the one place that makes me dwell on the meaning of things and ponder why things are the way they are.

There is something in the nature of tea that leads us into a world of quiet contemplation of life.

Poets knew that isolation in nature, far from people and things man-made, was good for the soul, and he'd always identified with poets.

Meditation is the tongue of the soul and the language of our spirit; and our wandering thoughts in prayer are but the neglects of meditation and recessions from that duty; according as we neglect meditation, so are our prayers imperfect, - meditation being the soul of prayer and the intention of our spirit.

I named this place Listening Point because only when one comes to listen, only when one is aware and still, can things be seen and heard. Everyone has a listening point somewhere. It does not have to be in the north or close to the wilderness, but someplace of quiet where the universe can be contemplated with awe.

The beginning of prayer is silence. If we really want to pray we must first learn to listen, for in the silence of the heart God speaks. And to be able to see that silence, to be able to hear God we need a clean heart; for a clean heart can see God, can hear God, can listen to God; and then only from the fullness of our heart can we speak to God. But we cannot speak unless we have listened, unless we have made that connection with God in the silence of our heart.

The quiet of the morning offers a perfect time to do a meditation and yoga practice. It also allows time to be creative or to contemplate before the business of the day.

True piety lies rather in the power to contemplate the universe with a quiet mind.

There is hardly any grief that an hour's reading will not dissipate.

Thrice happy he, who by some shady grove, Far from the clamorous world; doth live his own; Though solitary, who is not alone, But doth converse with that eternal love.

Praying gives sense, brings wisdom, broadens and strengthens the mind. The closet is a perfect school-teacher and schoolhouse for the preacher. Thought is not only brightened and clarified in prayer, but thought is born in prayer. We can learn more in an hour praying, when praying indeed, than from many hours in the study.

Fire is a good companion for the mind.

At a certain point, you say to the woods, to the sea, to the mountains, the world, Now I am ready. Now I will stop and be wholly attentive. You empty yourself and wait, listening.

I went down to the river, I set down on the bank. I tried to think but couldn't, So I jumped in and sank.

Mountains are not stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve, they are the cathedrals where I practice my religion.

The influence of fine scenery, the presence of mountains, appeases our irritations and elevates our friendships.

Pondering is a little like considering and a little like thinking, but looser. To ponder, one must let the facts roll around the rim of the mind's roulette wheel, coming to settle in whichever slot they feed pulled to.

On a fair prospect some have looked, And felt, as I have heard them say, As if the moving time had been A thing as steadfast as the scene On which they gazed themselves away.

The fruit of Silence is Prayer.

There is peace and rest and comfort in sorrow