R.S. Thomas Quotes

It seems that the creative faculty and the critical faculty cannot exist together in their highest perfection.

The long habit of living indisposeth us for dying.

Far graver is it to corrupt the faith that is the life of the soul than to counterfeit the money that sustains temporal life.

No sadder proof can be given by a man of his own littleness than disbelief in great men.

The function of posterity is to look after itself.

Measurement of life should be proportioned rather to the intensity of the experience than to its actual length.

It is the duty of a doctor to prolong life and it is not his duty to prolong the act of dying.

Prayer is the soul's breathing itself into the bosom of its heavenly Father.

Death and taxes are inevitable.

Change of weather is the discourse of fools.

Writing novels is the hardest thing I've ever done, including digging irrigation ditches.

The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.

When I severe my connections with the A.I.A. I do so with my own self respect, as a matter of pride and I am sure within your knowledge of my character.

A daydream is an evasion.

But all actors go through the process, it's hit and miss, you have achievement and failure.

Love and a red rose can't be hid.

The great thing in the world is not so much to seek happiness as to earn peace and self-respect.

October is a fine and dangerous season in America. a wonderful time to begin anything at all. You go to college, and every course in the catalogue looks wonderful.

Wishful thinking is not idealism. It is self-indulgence at best and self-exaltation at worst. In either case, it is usually at the expense of others. In other words, it is the opposite of idealism.

Clever men are good, but they are not the best.

We cannot suppose therefore that God has made an order of beings, with such mental qualities and powers, for the sole purpose of being used as beasts, or instruments of labour.

That the saints may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more abundantly they are permitted to see the punishment of the damned in hell.

The knowledge of God is the cause of things. For the knowledge of God is to all creatures what the knowledge of the artificer is to things made by his art.

It created a global platform that allowed more people to plug and play, collaborate and compete, share knowledge and share work, than anything we have ever seen in the history of the world.

The fearful unbelief is unbelief in yourself.

I wanted to learn everything I could about what it takes to be a great chef. It was a turning point for me.

I have a feeling, one of those gut feelings, that I'll make pretty good movies the rest of my life.

But presidential approval also became a surrogate measure of national unity and patriotism.

I forbid you, agnostic, doubting thoughts, to destroy the house of my faith.

I'm very wary of trust, you see.

I like to have a thing suggested rather than told in full. When every detail is given, the mind rests satisfied, and the imagination loses the desire to use its own wings.

We were promised a simpler life, and technology has only complicated our lives.

We are led by lawyers who do not understand either technology or balance sheets.

Few of the many wise apothegms which have been uttered have prevented a single foolish action.

Sometimes, when my wife and I were going out to dinner, I would take my laptop with me and work in the car, so as to take advantage of the half hour going and coming.

There is nothing that so much gratifies an ill tongue as when it finds an angry heart.

No slavery can be abolished without a double emancipation, and the master will benefit by freedom more than the freed-man.

There is in all visible things an invisible fecundity, a dimmed light, a meek namelessness, a hidden wholeness.

People have no idea what one saint can do: for sanctity is stronger than the whole of hell.

In the end, it's the reality of personal realtionships that save everything.

Our destiny is to live out what we think, because unless we live what we know, we do not even know it.

What is the use of praying if at the very moment of prayer, we have so little confidence in God that we are busy planning our own kind of answer to our prayer?

Prayer and love are really learned in the hour when prayer becomes impossible and your heart turns to stone.

It is in the ordinary duties and labors of life that the Christian can and should develop his spiritual union with God.

We must be true inside, true to ourselves, before we can know a truth that is outside us. But we make ourselves true inside by manifesting the truth as we see it.

In our creation, God asked a question and in our truly living; God answers the question.

I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.

There is always a temptation to diddle around in the contemplative life, making itsy-bitsy statues.

The solution of the problem of life is life itself. Life is not attained by reason and analysis but first of all by living.

The very contradictions in my life are in some ways signs of God's mercy to me.