Saint Augustine Quotes
There is something in humility which, strangely enough, exalts the heart, and something in pride which debases it.
Beauty is indeed a good gift of God; but that the good may not think it a great good, God dispenses it even to the wicked.
We take for granted the slow miracle whereby water in the irrigation of a vineyard becomes wine. It is only when Christ turns water into wine, in a quick motion, as it were, that we stand amazed.
Just as it is agreed that we all wish to be happy, so it is that we all wish to be wise, since no one without wisdom is happy.
And he departed from our sight that we might return to our hearts and find him there. For he left us, and behold, he is here.
Be always displeased with what you are if you wish to be what you are not. Always add, always walk, always proceed. Neither stand still nor go back nor deviate.
What you are must always displease you, if you would attain to that which you are not.
We cannot pass our guardian angel's bounds, resigned or sullen, he will hear our sighs.
Let us therefore yield ourselves and bow to the authority of the Holy Scriptures, which can neither err nor deceive.
Though defensive violence will always be 'a sad necessity' in the eyes of men of principle, it would be still more unfortunate if wrongdoers should dominate just men.
In the house of God there is never ending festival; the angel choir makes eternal holiday; the presence of God's face gives joy that never fails.
He who devoutly hears holy Mass will receive a great vigor to enable him to resist mortal sin, and there shall be pardoned to him all venial sins which he may have committed up to that hour.
When large numbers of people share their joy in common, the happiness of each is greater because each adds fuel to the other's flame.
Love God and do whatever you please: for the soul trained in love to God will do nothing to offend the One who is Beloved.
He that is kind is free, though he is a slave; he that is evil is a slave, though he be a king.
It is easy to want things from the Lord and yet not want the Lord Himself, as though the gift could ever be preferable to the Giver.
In failing to confess, Lord, I would only hide You from myself, not myself from You.
Drunkenness is a flattering devil, a sweet poison, a pleasant sin, which whosoever hath, hath not himself, which whosoever doth commit, doth not commit sin, but he himself is wholly sin.
Blessedness consists in the accomplishment of our desires, and in our having only regular desires.
The spiritual virtue of a sacrament is like light; although it passes among the impure, it is not polluted.
If you excuse yourself in confession, you shut up sin within your soul, and shut out pardon.
For if a thing is not diminished by being shared with others, it is not rightly owned if it is only owned and not shared.
God in his omnipotence could not give more, in His wisdom He knew not how to give more, in His riches He had not more to give, than the Eucharist.
It is not by change of place that we can come nearer to Him who is in every place, but by the cultivation of pure desires and virtuous habits.
Nothing, therefore, happens unless the Omnipotent wills it to happen. He either permits it to happen, or He brings it about Himself.
The world is a great book, of which they that never stir from home read only a page.
God bestows more consideration on the purity of the intention with which our actions are performed than on the actions themselves.
